‘Young Finny’ to Premiere in Newport : Concert: The musical fairy tale for children will be presented Saturday by Xtet, the versatile chamber ensemble.

A group of modern-music specialists, gathered originally to present the harlequin horrors of Schoenberg’s “Pierrot Lunaire,” may seem an implausibly forbidding source for a children’s program. Xtet’s most recent gig, after all, was the latest of the venerable and prestigious Monday Evening Concerts at the Los Angeles County Museum of Art, a series seldom filled with families.

But then, Xtet’s debut recording is “Gerald McBoing Boing and Other Heroes,” newly released by Delos on the label’s Music for Young People series. Saturday afternoon at the Newport Harbor Art Museum, the ensemble gives the premiere of “Young Finny from Fwyynyland.”

“Presenters are very interested in programs for children, so it’s a really practical thing, and there’s a real need for it,” says David Ocker, composer of the 30-minute “Young Finny” and the group’s clarinetist. “Acoustic chamber ensembles need to be worried about developing audiences and thinking 10 or 15 years ahead. Orchestras are already doing it, but chamber music has lagged behind.”

So what is a fwyyn ?

“A small forest creature, about whom you have to use your imagination,” Ocker says.

These creatures originated in “Fwyynghn,” a stage piece premiered at the CalArts Contemporary Music Festival in 1980. The name and its spelling satirize some of the creatures of Celtic folklore, according to Beatrice Manley, who wrote the librettos for both works.

“I was always interested in fairy tales--they seem to answer a need,” Manley says. “ ‘Young Finny’ has the kind of loveliness you find in fairy tales, but I think I bring something to it, my own kind of humor.”

In this case, the tale involves the efforts of Finny to escape the rather rigid boundaries of Fwyyn culture. He outwits his teacher, defeats a dragon-like beast known only as “The Evil Thing,” finds a princess and falls in love.

Ocker has cast the tale into a six-movement piece. Manley will narrate it, although the music also employs a soprano soloist.

“Sometimes the soprano is the main part,” says Ocker, “and sometimes she is one of the instruments.”

The composer has clear ideas about writing for young audiences.

“Keep the writing simple,” he advises, “with lots of tunes. There’s a lot of tone-painting in ‘Young Finny,’ probably more than in all of my other works. The music does need to relate to things they have heard, or will experience.”

One of the things Ocker does in many pieces is play with famous existing tunes, and “Young Finny” is no exception. In Finny’s confrontation with the Evil Thing, Ocker uses the storm scene from Beethoven’s “Pastoral” Symphony, something that will be familiar to anyone who has seen “Fantasia.”

And further, you might ask, what is an Xtet?

“We have real self-image problems this way,” Ocker says with a laugh. “ ‘X’ is a variable. The flexibility gives us the opportunity to do many things, but it is very ungainly organizationally. It also causes us to deal with music we might not do if the ensemble were rigidly fixed.”

The Xtet core is a dozen musicians, supplemented with frequent guest artists. The ensemble, founded in 1986, includes members of the Los Angeles Philharmonic, Los Angeles Chamber Orchestra, the Long Beach Symphony and Pasadena Symphony.

“Young Finny” is scored for string quartet, harp, flute, clarinet, percussion, soprano and narrator. Xtet member John Steinmetz, whose bassoon is not involved in the musical ensemble, will introduce the work with a guide to the instruments. Adam Stern, the Delos producer who conducted Xtet in the “Gerald McBoing Boing” recording, will lead the performance.

* “Young Finny From Fwyynyland,” a narrated chamber-music program by musical troupe XTET, will be presented Saturday at 2 p.m. at the Newport Harbor Art Museum, 850 San Clemente Drive, Newport Beach. Admission: $2 to $5. Information: (714) 759-1122.