Concert Choir mostly succeeds in festive show.

Byline: Concert review by Peter Bergquist For The Register-Guard

THE EUGENE Concert Choir, led by Diane Retallack, gave its annual holiday concert Sunday at the Hult Center. The concert followed the same pattern as in previous years, with the smaller Vocal Arts Ensemble taking the stage in Elizabethan costume for the first half, followed by the full chorus and orchestra.

The Vocal Arts Ensemble led off in festive style with a group of carols and other seasonal music. The costumes were handsome, as always, and the music was sung with taste and enthusiasm under Retallack's capable leadership. Contemporary arrangements alternated with older settings of Christmas texts. The audience joined in the closing number, "Deck the Halls."

For this concert, the chamber choir was amplified. This allowed the singers to achieve a full sound for the first group of pieces, with little if any distortion or loss of intimacy. The result was less happy in the concluding piece of the first half, Claudio Monteverdi's Magnificat from his 1610 Vespers.

In this piece, the vocal ensemble was joined by a small group of string and wind musicians from the Oregon Mozart Players. The players contributed some nice obbligatos to the piece, a few times playing antiphonally from the balconies.

The important solo voice parts were sung by members of the ensemble. Regrettably, they were minimally adequate, at best. Tone quality, intonation and agility all too often left much to be desired.

On top of this, the amplification sometimes exaggerated the shrillness of individual voices as well as the chorus. This was especially uncomfortable when Monteverdi had the chorus sing the traditional Magnificat chant in long notes while soloists or instruments moved around rapidly along with it. Balances sometimes were faulty as well, apparently because of the amplification.

Perhaps a small group of singers can profit from electronic enhancement in a large space such as Silva Hall, but it didn't work well in this instance.

After intermission, things got much better. The principal work was George Handel's Utrecht Te Deum and Jubilate, which he composed in 1713 for a public celebration of the treaty that ended the War of the Spanish Succession. This setting of the standard English texts of the Te Deum and Psalm 100 helped establish Handel in England, and it foreshadows the style of his later oratorios such as "Messiah."

The choir and musicians gave a fine, unamplified performance of the piece. Under Retallack's direction, tempos and pacing were well chosen, articulation of chorus and orchestra was clean and the balances were excellent. The ensemble work among all the performers was precise.

This also was true for the excellent vocal soloists: Judith Pannill, soprano; Don Ebel, countertenor; Mark Beudert, tenor; and Zheng Zhou, bass. Each sang beautifully throughout. Handel did not write long arias for any of them in this work, but each contributed important solo passages and blended nicely with the others in duos, trios and quartets.

The Oregon Mozart Players were in fine form for what was primarily a supporting role. The most prominent solos were the spectacular trumpet parts, ably played by David Bender and Stephen Dunn.

The large chorus sang beautifully throughout the piece. Their tone was strong but unforced, and they negotiated Handel's florid passage work with great clarity.

The program concluded with two more sing-alongs, first "O Come, All Ye Faithful." During this piece, those members of the audience who wished to came up on stage to join the chorus for the final number, the Hallelujah Chorus from Handel's "Messiah."

It was a fitting conclusion to a festive Christmas program that was on the whole highly enjoyable.

Peter Bergquist, a professor emeritus at the University of Oregon School of Music, reviews classical music for The Register-Guard.