CLASSICAL MUSIC / KENNETH HERMAN : Youngster Chooses Music Over Science and Excels

The subject of music competitions frequently evokes apprehension from the experts, including competition judges, but most observers agree that these events do serve one worthwhile purpose. For a brief moment, a competition shifts the public gaze from the select coterie of musical superstars--the Pavarottis, Perlmans, Sutherlands and Serkins--to a new generation of unknown performers.

Earlier this month, the Van Cliburn International Piano Competition focused attention on a dozen young pianists, including Coronado native Kevin Kenner.

Another local talent being noticed is La Jolla’s 14-year-old cellist Felix Fan, a young performer who has already made some impressive wins in regional contests. Last weekend, Fan performed with his chamber music ensemble in Los Angeles’ Young Artists Peninsula Music Festival.

On the basis of auditions held last month at Cal State University, Dominguez Hills, Fan and two colleagues, violinist Kevin Kumar and pianist Elaine Kao, were invited to perform works by Beethoven and Mendelssohn in the annual competition founded by pianist Erika Chary. Last year, Fan won the La Jolla Civic-University Orchestra’s Young Artist Competition after he took first prize in the California State Competition of the American String Teachers Assn.

Fan, who will enter the ninth grade this fall, has been studying cello since he was 4. After studying locally with San Diego Symphony cellist Glen Campbell, Fan joined the Los Angeles studio of noted cello pedagogue Eleanor Schoenfeld. While daily practice and his weekly lesson in Los Angeles impinge on his time outside of school, Fan is not solely fixated on music.

“I’m really active in sports,” he said. “I play baseball and basketball, and at least once a day my dad and I have a good game of Ping-Pong.”

Though his father is a biochemist, he has not pressured his son to excel in the sciences rather than pursue music.

“It’s really a good thing, since science is not one of my better subjects,” Fan said. “At this stage, it looks as though music is my best shot.”

Earlier this month, Fan completed an eight-city tour with four other musicians under the auspices of the Taiwanese Cultural Assn. Playing concerts that featured works by Taiwanese composer Tyzen Hsiao, as well as a Beethoven Piano Quintet and the Dvorak String Trio, Fan and his colleagues followed an itinerary that included New York, Boston, Chicago, Atlanta and Houston.

“The audience reception was really encouraging,” Fan said. “We had pretty good crowds and lots of standing ovations.”

The young cellist’s mother, Shu Fan, accompanied him on the tour, in the role of stage manager.

“She also carried my luggage,” Fan said.

Trumpet exodus. The San Diego Symphony’s four-man trumpet section will have a decidedly different makeup next season. Although principal trumpet Calvin Price has not notified symphony management of a change in his status, members of the brass section are betting that Price will accept his pending offer from the Philadelphia Orchestra. In April, Price won an audition there.

Symphony assistant trumpet Alan Siebert will take a year’s leave of absence from the orchestra to teach at Michigan State University in East Lansing. For the past five years, Siebert has taught trumpet and coached brass ensembles at San Diego State University, in addition to playing with the local symphony and San Diego Opera Orchestra.

“I never really pictured myself sitting in the back of an orchestra for 40 years,” Siebert said. “The symphony and opera orchestra schedules are pretty unrelenting. Teaching would allow me to reserve the summer for projects, making records and finishing up my doctorate at Arizona University.”

With both trumpeters gone, that leaves second trumpet John Wilds and symphony regular Mark Bedell in the trumpeters’ corner. No doubt the only people toasting this turn of events are the local free-lance trumpet players.

Fanfares. UC San Diego doctoral student Steven Takasugi has received a $2,500 commission from the La Jolla Civic-University Symphony. The 15-minute work for full orchestra will be given its premiere performance at UCSD’s Mandeville Auditorium in May by the La Jolla orchestra. . . .

Two local musicians, San Diego Opera’s chorus master, Martin Wright, and San Diego Symphony principal bassoon Dennis Michel, will be on this year’s Music Academy of the West faculty at Santa Barbara. Both will coach and perform in this 42nd season of the noted summer school, which runs from Sunday through Aug. 20 under the leadership of music director Lawrence Leighton Smith.

During his Santa Barbara residency, Wright will also have the opportunity to perform one of the major roles in his baritone repertory. On the Fourth of July, he will sing the National Anthem for the Santa Barbara Symphony.