MUSIC REVIEW : Violinist Midori, 17, in L.A. Recital Debut

There is always room for another talent, for another artistic perspective. Keep telling yourselves that, fiddlers, but stay away from Midori’s recitals--the illusion will keep better if you do.

For several years now, the only question about the 17-year-old violinist has been how she will mature. In her Los Angeles recital debut Tuesday evening at Royce Hall, she provided the answer: handsomely and quickly.

Concertos are one thing, recitals another, as many a Wunderkind has found out before. Midori’s substantial program posed little technical challenge for her--that was expected--but it also revealed a thoroughly poised artist with ideas as well as fleet fingers.

Richard Strauss’ diffuse, daunting early Sonata is not infrequently played, but seldom made a compelling, expressive vehicle. That Midori did, with sovereign, articulate control across a wide and tellingly employed dynamic and timbral range. Her concentration flagged in the opening of the Finale--she played the entire program from memory, a recital rarity these days--but otherwise made an eloquent, heated, completely personal statement with the piece.

Midori’s effort was enhanced by the alert and equally communicative pianism of Rohan de Silva. Throughout the evening he served both the soloist and the composers with comfortable, reliable playing.

There was an occasional tendency to exaggerate, most flagrant in a rhythmically wayward account of Wieniawski’s “Polonaise Brillante” in A, which ended up almost a parody.

She also took a mannered approach to the opening movement of Beethoven’s first Sonata, Opus 12, No. 1. But Midori found herself--and Beethoven--in the Sonata variations, producing a sparkling performance with all the virtues of youthfulness.

Intensity, flair and utter abandon to the music characterized Midori’s playing of Ravel’s “Tzigane” and Szigeti’s arrangement of Scriabin’s Etude in Thirds, Opus 8, No. 10. Only the desperate scramble of some of the left-hand pizzicato passages in “Tzigane” suggested the difficulty of the music, taken at a pace few others would dare.

The violinist, who received a $25,000 Dorothy B. Chandler Performing Arts Award as part of the 25th anniversary celebrations at the Music Center last month, appeared almost oblivious of the large, restive audience, which seemed to make a game of coughing during the Beethoven.

In encore, Midori and Silva offered Elgar’s “Salut d’Amour” and Sarasate’s “Zapateado,” miniature triumphs of elegance and fire.