MUSIC REVIEWS : Bruno Weil Fails Mozart in Philharmonic Debut

It is a truism, but one that bears repeating: Putting together a program of masterpieces doesn’t necessarily ensure success.

For instance: Bruno Weil, making his West Coast debut with the Los Angeles Philharmonic this week, arranged a wonderful agenda that could have thrilled the faithful and proved attractive to inexperienced concert-goers. It is a handsome and cogent Mozart program consisting of the Overture to “Don Giovanni,” the Piano Concerto in E-flat, K. 271, and the “Linz” Symphony.

At the first of four performances Thursday night in the Dorothy Chandler Pavilion of the Music Center, this program quite exposed Weil--a 40-year-old West German who has served as an assistant to the late Herbert von Karajan and as a provincial music director in his native country--as a conductor of little depth, pedestrian musical aspirations and apparently small achievement.

He simply failed to bring this great music to life.

In that failure, he was assisted minimally by the sometimes helpful Philharmonic players, who, when interested, can make an inept Mozartean seem better (i.e., more commanding) than he is. Without in any way sabotaging Weil’s efforts, the players merely gave him what his podium manner demanded: routine, pleasant, inattentive Mozart. The worst kind.

Never mind that the “Giovanni” overture ought to put the fear of God (or whatever) into the listener from the opening D-minor chord, and assert its seriousness in every subsequent bar. Forget that the Symphony No. 36 contains moments of stunning beauty, wondrous wit and sunny good humor. Ignore the seraphic youthfulness, the outpouring of melodies, the buoyancy in the Fifth Piano Concerto. None of these qualities ever materialized in Weil’s earthbound performances.

And the soloist of the evening, the Finnish pianist, Olli Mustonen, added nothing material to our love of Mozart.

Making his third Philharmonic appearance--his Grieg Concerto was clunky and inept, his Ravel Concerto merely promising--the 22-year-old musician looked awkward, often sounded inaudible and made a pipsqueak impression in this cherishable and important assignment.