Music Reviews : Conductor Jeffrey Tate Debuts With L.A. Philharmonic

Friday was not a night at the Dorothy Chandler Pavilion for the faint of heart or posterior. Or the impatient. British conductor Jeffrey Tate made his Los Angeles Philharmonic debut with a program emphasizing the musical grand and grandiose in some of their most familiar manifestations.

Wonderful to say, he brought fresh interest and life to Beethoven’s “Emperor” Concerto and Schubert’s “Great” C-major Symphony. What could have been an evening of epic routine turned instead into one of rediscovery.

Equal credit must go to soloist Richard Goode, who returns to the Pavilion tonight for a Philharmonic-sponsored recital of Beethoven sonatas. Goode’s was an “Emperor” both fastidious and joyful, in a performance of paradoxically controlled exuberance.

Goode brought a broad palette, a wide dynamic range and unflagging zeal to his work. Not a note was out of place nor a phrase unmanicured in his carefully calculated scheme, yet the results suggested spontaneous inevitability.

The pianist’s playing also reflected the clarifying influence of the period-practice crowd, without the enervated inhibitions that so often come with it. Tate and a scaled-down Philharmonic accompanied neatly enough for their own part, if not always tightly meshed with Goode.

After intermission, Tate elicited a full measure of sonic pomp and circumstance from the orchestra, on behalf of Schubert’s symphony. His view was expansive and rich in detail, but not at the expense of form or momentum, creating a singing structure of both immediate and cumulative beauty.

The Philharmonic played cleanly and suavely, and with special glory in the winds, who, with Tate’s encouragement, quite overwhelmed the strings at times. For all the authority of the performance, there were moments of missed communication between conductor and orchestra, including an oddly fizzled forzando final chord.