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SITE RATING:  1/10 SITE REVIEW:  Another privately-pressed album, this production of the Brentwood Presbyterian Church, with conductor Don Weiss is more ambitious than a casual glance might reveal; it features a full chamber orchestra, not just the organist listed on the credits.  There are intonation and pitch issues throughout the orchestra, which undercuts the listening experience, and hampers most of the album, but that's only the first of multiple faults.  Tenor James Umberger has a pleasant enough tone, his amateurism showing off only on the difficult melismas, but otherwise, he gives a solid performance.  Soprano Joan Anderson is fine - with a trilling tone that I found very sweet on her short "And Suddenly There Was With The Angel".  Alto Enid Jacobsen is rich and dark on "He Shall Feed His Flock", although the tempos again seem drenched in syrup, and bass Robert Bernard is blustery and strangely distant in the sound mix.  The combined Chapel and Chancel Choirs are earnest, but hampered by disunity and sluggish, leaden tempos that exaggerate the heavy downbeats.  Indeed, Weiss's tempos are the biggest fault here, with everything taken at tempos that only emphasize why the baroque revivalist movement of the late eighties took hold so strongly - much of what drags down this performance could have been cleaned up by a change of tempo - by making things "dance" and bounce lightly; whereas this entire album simply drags, the tempos adding to the pitch and intonation woes.

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