ORANGE COUNTY MUSIC REVIEWS : The Vienna Ensemble Plays at Center

The Vienna Chamber Ensemble, nine members of the Vienna Philharmonic directed by the orchestra’s concertmaster Gerhart Hetzel, is the kind of ensemble that sets musical standards. At the Orange County Performing Arts Center on Friday, the 19-year-old group quickly established mastery of the ideal of chamber music--civilized conversation among intimate, long-mutually supportive and forbearing friends.

Mozart’s Divertimento No. 15 and Schubert’s Octet in F were played. The program was sponsored by the Orange County Philharmonic Society.

The group’s heritage is “authentic Viennese style,” and in trying to define that elusive concept, one observes that the playing was strong and muscular without being insistent or aggressive. There was sentiment without sentimentality, sweetness without cloying excess, yielding without capitulation.

Individual voices emerged from the ensemble; they did not erupt or jostle for attention. And they continued the sense of musical line without unseemly breaks in dynamics or shape of phrasing.

Similarly, paired lines and ensemble playing were exquisitely judged in terms of reinforcing dynamics, color and expression.

For all the polish, the seamless starts and unisons, the overall, shared nuances of color and interpretation, the music-making never lacked a sense of discovery or spontaneity. Clearly, such unanimity of approach and expression only can be achieved by a group that has played together for a long time.

Individual players commanded attention nonetheless. Founder Hetzel, first violin, played with unpressured evenness and was able to carry sweetness into the heights, skating up long, arching lines without stumbling.

Clarinetist Norbert Taeubl was a wonder, apparently needing no pauses for breath in steadily supported lines played without burrs or bites, and offering delicate dabs of color, dramatic lines of dialogue or responsive musical thoughts, as required. Horn players Franz Sollner and Volker Altman elicited ethereal pianissimos.

Unfortunately, there were some members of the audience in Segerstrom Hall who persisted in mood-shattering applause after every movement.