Santa Barbara’s Symphony and Choral Society joined forces over the weekend at The Granada to present some lesser known — but precious — works by Wolfgang Amadeus Mozart and Giacomo Puccini.

The combined orchestra and choir gave a masterful performance of Puccini’s “Messa di Gloria,” a youthful work by the man who later produced some of opera’s most worldly and well-loved operas. Before composing theatrical masterworks such as “Tosca,” “La Boheme” and “Madama Butterfly,” the young Puccini created several liturgical works, including this Mass in 1880. He was the fifth generation of his family in the Italian town of Lucca to become a composer, and was expected to follow in the familial footsteps and write for the church. He quickly moved on to composing operas, after creating the “Messa di Gloria.”

Maestro Nir Kabaretti conducted the orchestra and the choral group was prepared by its celebrated director, Jo Anne Wasserman. The soloists were tenor Eduardo Villa and baritone Evan Hughes, young artists well-known to Santa Barbara music lovers.

The Mass was Puccini’s graduation exercise when he completed his term at the Instituto Musical Pacini in Lucca. It is in the traditional five-part form, from “Kyrie” to “Agnus Dei,” and yet from time to time bursts forth with the composer’s irrepressible lyricism, not to mention theatricality. At the conclusion, the “Agnus Dei” rose to a brief but stunning duet with Villa and Hughes.

Mozart’s “Concerto for Clarinet and Orchestra in A major, K. 622,” featured Håkan Rosengren as soloist. He is an alumnus of the State Academy of Music in Stockholm, the Royal Flemish Conservatory in Belgium, and UCSB. Rosengren is also a recording artist with a large discography and the winner of many international awards.

His performance of the concerto was exemplary. History tells us that Mozart loved the clarinet, and this work completed shortly before his death is a fine example. Rosengren fulfilled all the composer’s demands for flexibility and feeling. The concerto was dedicated to the memory of the Santa Barbara Symphony’s long-time clarinetist, Fred Harlow, who died in 2007.

The program began with Mozart’s brief but charming overture to “The Impresario, K. 486.” This was one of those small commissions Mozart tossed off while desperate for money. But, of course, a Mozart trifle is everybody else’s little treasure.

The symphony’s final scheduled concert of the season will take place at The Granada on May 9 and 10, featuring the “Fourth Symphony” of Johannes Brahms and Piotr Ilyich Tchaikovsky’s “Piano Concerto No. 1 in B-flat Minor,” with soloist Sergio Tiempo.

— Margo Kline covers the arts as a Noozhawk contributor.