Veteran Flutist Steps Into the Spotlight

When Anne Diener Giles joined the Los Angeles Philharmonic as co-principal flutist in 1971, she was 22 years old and just out of Juilliard.

“Those years certainly flew by,” Giles, still a member of the orchestra, still “thrilled to be doing what I’m doing,” said last week following a morning rehearsal.

This week, the now-veteran flutist emerges from the orchestra to appear as soloist. In the Dorothy Chandler Pavilion, Friday and Saturday nights at 8, and next Sunday afternoon at 2:30, Giles will play Mozart’s Concerto in D, K. 314, with the Philharmonic, Andre Previn conducting. The remainder of the program lists works of Aaron Copland (“Statements” and “Appalachian Spring”) and Brahms (the Variations on a Theme of Haydn).

“It’s always scary, stepping from the middle of the orchestra out into the solo spot,” Giles admitted. “And Mozart, well, when you’re a child, it seems so easy. The older one becomes, however, the harder it gets.”

The last time Giles appeared as soloist with the Philharmonic, she recalled, was in Leonard Bernstein’s “Halil,” in 1983. “I’ve had five years to forget the terror,” she jokes.

A native of New York State, Giles has lived for the past several years in Long Beach, an easy commute for a Philharmonic player, with her husband--pianist and music professor Allen Giles--and their 10-year old daughter, Katy.

“I guess I can call myself a Californian now,” the flutist acknowledged.

In whatever spare time she can find, Giles teaches a handful of students--”Teaching is my passion”--and reads “voraciously.”

Among many other strong reading interests, she counts American history high, admitting that those interests are wide-ranging. “Yes, I could go on ‘Jeopardy!,’ ” she believes. “I like the idea of filling in the spaces that were left in my education when I concentrated so completely on the flute as a youngster.”

THIS WEEK: The Stuttgart Chamber Orchestra, making three Southern California stops on its current, ninth North American tour, plays in Royce Hall at UCLA Saturday night at 8. Conducted by Patrick Strub, the program lists works by Geminiani, Mozart, Janacek and Tchaikovsky. The ensemble plays at El Camino College next Sunday and at the Orange County Performing Arts Center April 19. . . . Israeli violinist Carmit Zori appear on the Pro Musicis recital series at the County Museum of Art Wednesday at 8 p.m. Assisted by pianist Charles Abramovic, Zori will play sonatas by Corelli, Schumann, Kirchner and Franck, and shorter works by Brahms and Wieniawski. . . . The world premiere performance of Shony Alex Braun’s 5-movement “Symphony of the Holocaust” will be given Saturday night at 8 by the Garden Grove Symphony in Don Wash Auditorium at Garden Grove High School. . . . With pianist Jean-Philippe Collard as guest artist, the Muir String Quartet will play for Coleman Concerts in Beckman Auditorium at Caltech today at 3:30 p.m. The program: quartets by Schubert and Benjamin Britten and Cesar Franck’s Piano Quintet.

FESTIVALS AND SUCH: Gregory Hines, Jane Goldberg, Gene Bell, Chris Belliou, Bunny Briggs and Eddie Brown are among the participants in the Los Angeles Tap Festival, April 23 and 24 at Hollywood Live, 6840 Hollywood Blvd. For information or brochure: (213) 464-8381, Ext. A300. . . . A 6-day international conference and festival on Leos Janacek and Czech music will be held at Washington University in St. Louis May 4-9. This first North American conference on Janacek will host 40 scholars from six nations, including 12 Czechs--supposedly the largest number of Czech musicologists to attend a conference outside Czechoslovakia. The event also features the North American premieres of Janacek’s recently rediscovered “Danube” Symphony and a feature-length film biography of Janacek by Czech film maker Jaromil Jires. Information: (314) 889-5581. . . .

The first U.S.A. International Harp Competition will be held July 3-16, 1989, on the campus of Indiana University in Bloomington. Susann McDonald, chairman of the Indiana University harp department, will serve as director of the competition. For information, write Competition, P.O. Box 2718, Bloomington, Ind. 47402.

SINGERS: Baritone Sherrill Milnes returns to Ambassador Auditorium tonight at 8. With his longtime pianist, Jon Spong, assisting, Milnes will sing arias by Handel, Marcello, Gretry and Thomas, and songs by Schubert, Santoliquido, Somervell, Dello Joio and Janowski. . . . Elly Ameling also returns to Ambassador this week. The beloved Dutch soprano, with Rudolf Jansen at the piano, will sing two arias from Mozart’s “Nozze di Figaro,” plus songs by Haydn, Mozart, Schubert, Brahms, Mendelssohn, Wolf, Schumann, Richard Strauss, Josef Marx, Gounod, Faure, Caplet, Poulenc and Duparc. . . . Monday night, in Gindi Auditorium at the University of Judaism, Roberta Alexander and John Shirley-Quirk, with Andre Previn at the piano, will sing excerpts from Mahler’s “Des Knaben Wunderhorn” on a Los Angeles Philharmonic Chamber Music Society program. . . .Under the direction of John Alexander, the Pacific Chorale will depart on its fifth European tour in June. During the two-week tour, the ensemble will perform with the Lamoureaux Orchestra at La Madeleine in Paris, with the National Orchestra of Belgium in Ostend, Arlon and Brussels, and with the Oxford Pro Musica at the Dorchester Festival in England.