MUSIC REVIEW : California Chamber Virtuosi at Pepperdine University

The Sunday concert by the California Chamber Virtuosi in Smothers Theatre at Pepperdine University, Malibu, was an afternoon of subtle pleasures, and therefore all the more cherishable.

As usual, artistic director Henri Temianka assembled an accomplished group of musicians and provided informal and informative spoken commentary.

The concert began with an elegantly wrought performance of Mozart’s Oboe Quartet, K. 370. Oboist Allan Vogel brought graceful, liquid lyricism to what amounts to the solo part in this score, and readily communicated with intimate feeling.

His partners--violinist Margaret Batjer, violist Donald McInnes, cellist William DeRosa--furnished sensitive, taut underpinning, ever-ready in following Vogel’s direction with the solo line, singing gracefully themselves when given the foreground.

After intermission, pianist Alan Smith joined Batjer and DeRosa for Beethoven’s “Archduke” Trio in a performance of remarkable eloquence and refinement. The unhurried tempos, poised balances and gently arched, lucidly expressive phrasing allowed the work to blossom on its own accord. The players gave particular warmth and urgency to passages at softer dynamic levels, keeping the musical argument firmly on its path.

As the centerpiece of the program, the Two Rhapsodies for viola, oboe and piano by the Alsatian-American composer Charles Loeffler (1861-1935) proved attractive in a modest, quaint way.

Inspired by poems entitled “The Pond” and “The Bagpipe” by Maurice Rollinat, Loeffler combines Debussyan harmonies and sonorities with a more expansive, late Romantic melodicism in these earnest, sometimes picturesque, pieces. At about 10 minutes each, however, they outstayed their welcome, despite the attentive ministrations of Vogel, McInnes and Smith.