MUSIC REVIEW : Institute Orchestra, Seven Conductors Survey Mozart

The “Mozart Akademie” presented in Hollywood Bowl by members of the class of 1991 at the L.A. Philharmonic Institute, plus seven conductors, was not the final word on Mozart this summer.

Still to come in Cahuenga Pass: four Mozart evenings, Aug. 20-29, when 14 more works by this year’s most feted composer are scheduled at regular Tuesday-Thursday L.A. Philharmonic concerts, outdoors.

The Sunday night event, however, did live up to its promise to become a mini-marathon: It lasted from 6:40 until 10:45 and enlisted the services of a number of incipient and veteran Mozarteans.

And, for the most part, gave pleasure. Some of those pleasures were pedestrian, but others proved special.

In the last third of the evening, for instance--the concluding portion following a second intermission--there was a bright and brittle reading of the “Nozze di Figaro” Overture by the Institute Orchestra; a run-through of the Piano Concerto in A, K. 488, in which Misha Dichter, after an uneventful opening movement, achieved pianistic poetry of the most persuasive kind in the Andante, and a revival of Act IV of “Nozze”--with the usual cuts, of course--neatly sung by nine Southern California vocal artists and brilliantly played by the student orchestra.

Lawrence Foster led those last two installments in the marathon with his usual authority and with the kind of focused energy that can galvanize young musicians into high achievement. Institute Conducting Fellow Arthur Post presided over the Overture.

In the “Figaro” excerpt, Hector Vasquez showed himself a vigorous and mellow-sounding Figaro, Jennifer Smith proved a confident Susanna, with Jennifer Trost and John Atkins properly authoritative and resonant as the Almavivas.

There were other high points in this long concert, most notably Jaime Laredo’s strongly projected contributions, both as conductor and soloist, in the G-major Violin Concerto and in the Symphony No. 31 (“Paris”).

Presiding without podium, Laredo led stylish performances while producing brilliant and elegant solo lines. As both fiddler and conductor, the Institute players could ask for no better role model than this one.

Susan Davenny Wyner and Thomas Dausgaard, Institute Conducting Fellows both, accomplished impressive, serious readings of the C-minor Wind Serenade and the “Zauberflote” Overture, respectively.

In the opening portion of the evening, Wyner led the instrumental ensemble when Sheryl Staples was violin soloist in the Adagio in E. Institute Conducting Fellow William Eddins began the program by leading the “Entfuhrung aus dem Serail” Overture.

David Alan Miller, the Philharmonic’s former associate conductor, led only one work on this marathon, that being the Concerto for Two Pianos. Cipa and Misha Dichter were the soloists in a polished if low-energy reading, distinctive mostly for Misha Dichter’s clever cadenzas and the imperturbable way the couple played them.

Attendance: 9,725 listeners, plus a few passing aircraft.