MUSIC REVIEWS : ENTREMONT AND VIENNA ENSEMBLE AT EL CAMINO

Neither the most accomplished nor the most scrappy band of instrumentalists to tour the United States in recent seasons, the Vienna Chamber Orchestra from Austria, this time under its French conductor, Philippe Entremont, returned to us after a 10-year absence Tuesday night in Stuart Marsee Auditorium at El Camino College.

And pleased a kindly audience with just over an hour’s worth of music neatly performed. The program offered Helmut Eder’s “Piece de Concert”--written for this ensemble, and given its premiere performance by the VCO, two years ago--the Piano Concerto No. 14 by Mozart, with Entremont serving as his own soloist, and Tchaikovsky’s Serenade for Strings.

If one seems to be withholding critical huzzahs for the perfectly professional and competent work of this ensemble and of conductor/pianist Entremont, the reason is simple. Given the high standards of our several resident chamber orchestras in Southern California, and the many chances we get annually to hear some of the best of the touring ones, a visit by this organization seems unnecessary.

Still, the virtues of the 19-member string orchestra may be chronicled. An easy sense of ensemble, coupled with strong and usually consistent technical achievement, characterizes the group’s playing. The sound of the orchestra is not lush, nor are its performances highly polished, but it does what it does well enough.

Pianist Entremont, who has played here often in a career now in its fourth decade--though he will be only 52 in June, he started early--was making his local debut as conductor, and impressed with the quiet routine he brought to that function.

As a podium personality, he showed nothing out of the ordinary, however, though as keyboardist he reveled in the opportunities in Mozart’s early E-flat concerto for elegance and articulate music-making.

Eder’s gamely atonal, pleasantly virtuosic “Piece de Concert,” barely nine minutes in length, proved a piquant opener to the evening.