HALL CHORALE IN ‘EVENING OF ROMANCE’

It was a bizarre juxtaposition--”An Evening of Romance” on election night--but the mellifluous and superbly flexible William Hall Chorale pulled it off with only the slightest of glitches Tuesday night at Ambassador Auditorium.

For the 100-voice group, romance was more a state of mind--and of sound--than of style or period. A brace of Mozart nocturnes, complete with clarinet trio, was treated by reduced choral forces with classical taste and clarity, but the sweet innocence of the pieces shone through. And in the more unabashedly lush works--Schumann’s “So wahr die Sonne scheinet,” for example--the sheer mass of sonic output hardly ever obscured their intimate intent.

The glitches? Mostly intonation and, rarely, balance: Schumann’s canonic setting of Rueckert’s “Die Rose stand im Tau” was spoiled by flatness in the lower voices and miscalculated phrasing, while some slight balance smudges marred an otherwise effective performance of the same composer’s “Zigeunerleben.”

But on this night the virtues far outshone the miscues. In addition to the Schumann works, the chorale made ravishing sounds in Brahms’ “An die Heimat” and Norman Dello Joio’s “Come to Me, Love.”

Since romance is at least part drama, the chorale provided that dimension as well: Its burnished stark reading of Hugo Wolf’s “Im stillen Friedhof” was genuinely spooky, and the zoom and gloom of Randall Thompson’s “Tarantella” was infused with a hushed melancholy.

The highlight of the evening was surely the complete cycle of Brahms’ “Neues Liebeslieder” waltzes, originally written for vocal quartet with four-handed piano accompaniment. Oftentimes a full choral treatment turns the mercurial moods of the vocal love vignettes into so much sludge. Fortunately, Hall kept his charges on the lean side and fine solo turns by chorale members--most notably soprano Jennifer Smith--helped provide the necessary changes in texture and dynamics.

Pianist Brent McMunn--marking his final appearances with Hall’s group--provided sparkling, extremely sensitive accompaniment throughout the evening. He will be missed.