MUSIC REVIEW : BSO in L.A.--Solid but Disappointing

Thrills abound when the Boston Symphony Orchestra--call it the BSO--visits Los Angeles. ‘Twas ever thus, as aficionados of the symphonic muse will tell you, going back 40 years and more in recalling tours of the orchestra to our waiting shores.

When the BSO returned to the Dorothy Chandler Pavilion of the Music Center Tuesday night, however, the last local visit anyone could remember was all of 10 years ago. That is a long time to stay away.

Appropriately, then, a sold-out house warmly greeted the touring musicians and their music director for the past two decades, Seiji Ozawa, before the concert began.

What one heard subsequently was most respectable, a solid and admirable performance of an old-fashioned, display program. But disappointing.

The BSO remains a virtuoso instrument--as most observers agree it has been through the thins and thicks of this century--capable of great music making.

Tuesday, in a program encompassing Rossini’s “Semiramide” Overture, Beethoven’s Eighth Symphony and Bartok’s Concerto for Orchestra, the ensemble played below its remembered standard, indeed, below the higher standard of some of its North American peers--say, the orchestras of Chicago, Cleveland, Philadelphia and, yes, Los Angeles.

Showmanship and musical thoroughness, the hallmarks of Ozawa’s deservedly admired conducting, informed the proceedings. All the orchestral choirs--woodwinds and brass in particular--seemed to give of their best. Solo lines were splendidly handled.

Yet this event became a series of less than inspired, if certainly acceptable, performances. Furthermore, the vaunted transparency of the Boston sound seemed to materialize only infrequently. More often than not, true definition of inner voices and genuine clarity simply did not happen.

Most disappointing was the pedestrian reading Ozawa & Co. accomplished of the Concerto for Orchestra, a work every symphonic maven knows was written for this band 47 years ago.

Blame the conductor, if you will, but this run-through lacked the mystery, dash, concentration and virtuoso whiplash of the great readings in memory, some of which may even be Ozawa’s.

At the beginning of the evening, orchestra and conductor turned the “Semiramide” Overture into a grandiose showpiece offering mellow brass, self-consciously articulate strings, bright and striking contrasts and long, wow ‘em crescendos. The horns were wonderful.

Ozawa followed that with a very aggressive and unrelaxed push through Beethoven’s Eighth, which also showed the orchestra in its display mode.

The BSO played a different program in the Pavilion Wednesday night.