MUSIC REVIEW : A Concert With More Odor Than Order

A new, high-powered training ensemble the Los Angeles Philharmonic Institute Orchestra--made a sprawling debut amid the alfresco wonders of Hollywood Bowl on Sunday.

The agenda began with the three Bs--Berlioz, Bernstein and Brahms--and ended with some superclimactic Tchaikovsky. It enlisted the services of three stellar soloists--Lynn Harrell, Jaime Laredo and Sharon Robinson--and four conductors--three students plus the formidable and formidably eccentric Yuri Temirkanov of the Leningrad Philharmonic.

Under the circumstances, it may be significant that the biggest commotion among the 8,021 music and picnic lovers in attendance was caused by a skunk.

The furry little creature, dramatically savvy to say the least, chose the throbbing introduction of the fate motive of Tchaikovsky’s Symphony No. 4 for his entrance music. His exact location remained a mystery. Nevertheless, he managed to make his presence felt in the vast amphitheater.

We do not know if the presence was felt on the stage. The eager young players, who have flocked to hazy California from such disparate locales as Boston and Bulgaria, may have been extraordinarily stoic in the line of duty. More likely, they were too busy trying to decode the hazy signals of Temirkanov to notice anything so mundane as a major olfactory invasion.

Give them credit for trying. True to his best (or is it worst?) whimsical form, Temirkanov threw cutesy cues to the violins behind his back, mustered a delirious imitation of a weary snake charmer if the spirit moved him, beat time when one least expected orthodoxy, distended tempos almost beyond reason, and often accented secondary impulses at the expense of primary ideas.

He offered an awesomely willful interpretation that reached for heroic pathos one moment and lapsed into perverse distortion the next. He explored daring extremes of slow motion most of the time, then enforced breathless, emphatically fiery frenzy in the finale. If nothing else, this conductor takes the fuoco of allegro con fuoco seriously.

The Institute Orchestra managed to keep pace much of the time, and played with massive fervor throughout. This is a hardy band.

The rather incoherent evening began with Berlioz’s “Roman Carnival” overture, tautly conducted by Susan Davenny Wyner, who had last appeared at the Bowl 11 years ago as soprano soloist in Bach’s B-minor Mass and Beethoven’s “Missa Solemnis.” A traffic accident ended her promising vocal career in 1983.

The obligatory bow to Leonard Bernstein, who had been one of the original directors of the Institute, took the tiny form of the first “Meditation” for cello from “Mass.” Harrell, the current artistic director, surveyed the perfumed piety under the sensitive baton of Thomas Dausgaard.

In Brahms’ Concerto for violin and cello, the centerpiece of the program, the baton passed to Arthur Post, who wielded it with considerable suavity. The over-amplification system, ever in the state of flux, seemed to make Jaime Laredo’s virtuosic violin sound tinny, but Sharon Robinson’s cello brooded and soared with imposing resonance.