PHILHARMONIC VETERAN HAS A HORN OF PLENTY

William Lane, a 14-season veteran of the Los Angeles Philharmonic, says he has also become a Californian in the process of playing in the orchestra since 1973.

“Musically, I can’t think of a place where I could be more happy, or more busy,” the personable, 43-year-old hornist says. He acknowledges that he accepts free-lance, studio work when his Philharmonic duties permit. And he points out that, as a father, he also serves as “a full-time referee” between sons Trevor and Spencer, ages 11 and 5 respectively.

Scheduled to appear as soloist with the Philharmonic and music director Andre Previn on the final program of the Music Center subscription season this week (Thursday and Friday at 8 p.m. and next Sunday at 2:30), Lane recalls that he has been a soloist with his own orchestra some 20 times in the past 14 seasons.

The vehicle of his appearance, Mozart’s Second Horn Concerto, K. 417, is one he has ridden before, at Hollywood Bowl, under the direction of Christopher Hogwood. It is a favorite concerto with many horn players. Lane says he likes the inscription the composer put on the work, dedicated to his friend, the hornist, Joseph Leitgeb: “W.A. Mozart took pity on Leitgeb--ass, ox and fool--in Vienna, on March 27, 1783.”

What will be different since Lane last soloed with the orchestra will be his new instrument.

“I got it last summer. It was made by Paxman of England, who make only horns. It’s a triple horn, and I expected to take a long time to break it in. As it turned out, I got it one morning, and played it, in ‘Sacre du Printemps,’ that night.

“Since then, I’ve played it on everything. It’s like my Strad.”

CHAMBER MUSIC NOW: Two major string quartets return to our bailiwick this week, and Coleman Concerts hosts its annual competition for chamber ensembles. The Juilliard Quartet concludes a three-concert, season-long celebration of its 40th anniversary at Ambassador Auditorium, Thursday night, with a program devoted to Mozart’s Quartet in D, K. 575, Bartok’s Fifth Quartet and Beethoven’s Quartet in C-sharp minor, Opus 131. . . . On the Chamber Music in Historic Sites series (and already sold-out), next Sunday at 2:30 p.m., the Tokyo Quartet plays music of Schubert, Mendelssohn and Beethoven in the intimate (300-listener capacity) Higashi Hongwanji Temple in Little Tokyo. . . . The 41st annual Coleman Chamber Ensemble Competition takes place Saturday and next Sunday at Caltech, with four awards to be given totaling $9,000. Among the judges will be David Shifrin, Mehli Mehta, Jascha Brodsky, Edward Auer and Barry Benjamin.

AND CHAMBER MUSIC LATER: The John Anson Ford and Japan America theaters will each host chamber music festivals between the winter and summer seasons this year.

Cellist Robert Martin is the producer of “Chamber Music at the Ford,” a series of three outdoor concerts at the refurbished Ford Theatre in Hollywood, the weekend of June 5-7. Among the players scheduled to appear in the 1,100-seat amphitheater will be violinist Hiroko Yajima, violist Samuel Rhodes, clarinetist James Kanter, pianist Cynthia Raim, hornist James Thatcher, the New York-based Aulos Ensemble and the Sequoia Quartet (of which Martin used to be a member). Information: (213) 464-2826.

What began last year as the Sitka/L.A. Festival becomes the Chamber Music/L.A. Festival, offering seven concerts, five of them in the Japan America Theatre, downtown, two in Smothers Theatre in Malibu, May 14-24.

“It was the overwhelming response from the Los Angeles audience that made us decide to change the name to emphasize our own identity and location,” explains founder/artistic director/violinist Yukiko Kamei. At the same time, the violinist and some of her colleagues retain their connections to the Alaska festival.

Among Kamei’s associates in 1987 will be Ida Kavafian, Nathaniel Rosen, Sarah Walker, Gary Gray, Jeffrey Solow, Christiaan Bor, James Dunham, and others. Highlights include the local premiere of Takemitsu’s “Rocking Mirror Daybreak” (May 17), an “Octet Evening” (May 23) and a “Tribute to Kreisler” (May 15). Information: (213) 559-5676.

AN AUDITORIUM FOR FONTANA: In what used to be the United Steelworkers Hall, the City of Fontana has created its own performing arts center. The facility, originally built in 1956 and recently refurbished at a cost in excess of $400,000, now includes a 1,000-seat auditorium and a banquet room seating an audience of 400. The Fontana Performing Arts Center will open this week, with a concert by Symphonia California, an ensemble described by the center’s manager, Phillip Solomonson, as “a volunteer orchestra with 80 members, ranging in age from 11 to 70.”

Soloist at the inaugural concert of the center, Wednesday night at 8, will be violinist Mischa Lefkowitz, who will play Mozart’s A-major Concerto and Dvorak’s Romance and Mazurka. The orchestral portion will include an excerpt from Howard Hanson’s “Merry Mount” and Tchaikovsky’s Second Symphony. Conducting the concert will be Robert Walters, music director of Symphonia California and administrator of the Community School of Music and the Arts of Redlands University. The Community School now takes up residence at the Performing Arts Center.