MUSIC REVIEW : Previn, Ax at Hollywood Bowl

Never take performances at Hollywood Bowl for granted. Thursday evening, Andre Previn, Emanuel Ax and the Los Angeles Philharmonic turned the ambiguous promise of a program matching Berlioz and Beethoven staples with Shostakovich’s Fifth Symphony into one of the most stimulating and successful concerts of the summer.

Ironically, the program drew a relatively small and restless crowd of 8,331, which handed in what may have been the most extended and disruptive bottle-rolling display of the summer. In a sad tribute to the clarity and subtlety of the performance, chatter and coughing proved far more distracting than the usual external interruptions.

Shostakovich’s Fifth is another work that Previn & Co. are taking to Japan on their upcoming tour, and it is also on their season-opening program at the Music Center next month. In matters of balance and rhythmic cohesion, there is still some work to be done, but the effort is already a comprehensive, genuinely exciting one.

Previn’s interpretation was both uncompromisingly logical and emotionally exigent. Seldom has “A Soviet Artist’s Reply to Just Criticism,” as the composer subtitled his symphony, been more forcefully expressed, or the human tragedy of the slow movement projected with such austere nobility.

Beethoven’s C-minor Piano Concerto shares some of the same sentiments, Classically tempered. Ax stated its case with impeccable technical authority and an uncommon degree of nuance. Tempos in the first two movements fluctuated more than is currently fashionable, but never lapsed into capriciousness.

This rhapsodic style produced some disagreements between soloist and orchestra, particularly in the first movement. Otherwise, Previn’s accompaniment matched Ax in the combination of rhetorical richness and technical control.

The concert began with a crackling, genially explosive account of Belioz’s “Beatrice et Benedict” Overture. Clean lines and textures and vigorous, supple panache characterized the reading Previn elicited.