MUSIC REVIEW : Soloists Keep Chamber Group Above Water

From the enthusiastic full house at Sherwood Auditorium Monday night, it appears that music director Donald Barra and his San Diego Chamber Orchestra have discovered the right formula for survival. The ensemble’s final concert of the 1989-90 season boasted a well-balanced program and a pair of attractive guest soloists, violinist Jaime Laredo and cellist Sharon Robinson.

Taken on its own terms, the orchestra ended its fifth season on an entirely respectable note, and the other local chamber orchestras that were competing for audience loyalty when Barra started his group have long since bitten the dust.

But is it impolite to inquire if anyone would come to hear this orchestra without the obligatory soloists? Without an appearance by Gustavo Romero, the Empire Brass, Bella Davidovich, or Barry Tuckwell--to enumerate some soloists of recent memory--an evening with this orchestra is rarely musically compelling or exciting. Even on a good night, and Monday was a good night, Barra’s crew makes it by the skin of its teeth.

The orchestra’s star turn on this program was Stravinsky’s eight-movement “Pulcinella Suite,” an apt choice both to feature the orchestra’s principal players in flashy solos and to test the group’s mettle. Although Barra dutifully traced the outlines of Stravinsky’s neoclassical gem, the performance never sparkled. It may be true that orchestras of this type are chronically under-rehearsed, but this group managed to underscore its tentative grasp on the piece at every turn.

Laredo and Robinson proved most convincing in Vivaldi’s seldom-heard Concerto for Violin and Cello. Although their approach was large-scaled, they did Vivaldi no grave injustice. Barra and the orchestra provided dependable, albeit monochromatic, accompaniment to the concerto.

Robinson belabored Tchaikovsky’s “Variations on a Rococo Theme” to a fault, however, fussing over details and missing its gracious, Romantic sweep. Perhaps she thought Tchaikovsky’s title was “Rococo Variations.” Although Laredo conducted the orchestra for this work, he was not able to get the players to synchronize with the soloist’s highly personal approach.

Laredo opened the concert with J. S. Bach’s Violin Concerto in A Minor, which he conducted from the podium. If this was not Bach for the purist’s ear, and, if the middle movement sounded a bit stodgy, it must be admitted that the unfailingly secure soloist coaxed an unforced and far more mellifluous sound out of the San Diego Chamber strings than we are accustomed to hearing. We should be ever be thankful for small favors.