If this Pasi n is the great popular masterwork I suspect it to be, it is because it is at once familiar and strange. Popular dance styles the mambo, the rumba, the bossa nova lighten the deepening tragedy. Flamenco foot-stomping, at the point of Pilate s interrogation of Jesus, raises tension to the breaking point. Quivering accordion licks add nighttime luridness. Tito Puente arrives in a braying of trumpets.
Languorous ballads add a sorrowful sweetness.
Elevating the work above any hint of pastiche is Mr. Golijov s deft use of contemporary classical idioms. Totemic repetitions of Stravinsky, the minimal churnings of Steve Reich and the wistful figuration of Arvo P rt are woven into the translucent fabric, not as quotations but as enrichment. The effect is at once raw and sophisticated, and thanks to the composer s skill at modulating moods clamor gives way to quietude with the suddenness of stars coming out after a storm riveting. It is also a work that must have been immensely difficult to prepare. The Boston performances, in Symphony Hall, came four months after the Pasi n s highly acclaimed world premiere in Stuttgart, where it was heard as part of a multinational festival of four new Passions commissioned by the conductor and Bach specialist Helmuth Rilling.