Music Reviews : Soloists Dominate Festival Concert

The Strawberry Creek Music Festival, in full swing at Pepperdine University, offered one of conductor Yehuda Gilad’s specialties Thursday night in Smothers Theatre: a terrific early-18th-Century grab-bag program, served up by a Baroque orchestra and featuring some dazzling solo playing.

Besides the Baroque Biggies, Bach, Handel and Vivaldi, there were works by Pietro Baldassare and Jan Dismas Zelenka.

Gilad and forces began in polished mid-season stride with Handel’s “Agrippina” Overture. Gerard Reuter executed the solo oboe recitativo in perfect imitation of the sensitivity and emotional eloquence of the human voice.

Baldassare’s Sonata No. 1 in F for Cornetto, Strings and Continuo, became a tour de force through trumpeter Anthony Plog’s impeccable breath control, refined dynamics and flawless runs.

Zelenka was represented by his Five Capriccios (1729). Richard Todd strove valiantly with its daunting writing for horn, and with self-critical honesty resisted taking a bow because he fell short of his mark.

Soloist Kenneth Munday’s technical abandon and secure musicality made an excellent case for Vivaldi’s snappy, demanding A-minor bassoon concerto.

Bach’s “Brandenburg” Concerto No. 1 began, as it does often, with the challenging harmonies and syncopated horn rhythms of the opening Allegro sounding like bobbles.

But thereafter, Gilad’s buoyant direction, the precision and clarity of string playing and the superbly executed sextet in the Menuetto (with Todd redeeming himself) carried the performance on a consistently high level.