MUSIC REVIEW : Explorer, Pacific Symphony Go On a Wayward Journey : David Atherton, a fearless adventurer of the 20th Century at his best, and the orchestra deliver an inconsistently played program.

David Atherton and the Pacific Symphony. The possibilities were intriguing.

Atherton, founder of the fearless London Sinfonietta and former chief of the San Diego Symphony, can be a stimulating explorer of well-known and hidden treasure coves of the 20th Century. On occasion, the Pacific Symphony can reach back and deliver a very convincing impression of a major orchestra.

Alas, neither party was at its best at the Orange County Performing Arts Center on Wednesday night.

The Pacific sounded scrappy in various degrees throughout the night, with the strings, and occasionally the winds, having trouble executing rapid passages together. And Atherton, having taken on a rather safe (for him) program, seemed wayward, even unfocused at times.

For openers, Mendelssohn’s Overture, “The Hebrides,” emerged as a rather genteel seascape, ultra-legato, with the dynamic extremes and urgency compressed. More of a calm and prosperous voyage, you could say.

With reduced yet still ample personnel, Atherton could display a suspenseful feeling for the droll humor of Haydn’s Symphony No. 90, particularly in the second movement and the Finale. However, the pace often seemed to drag, the strings experienced passages of disarray, and Atherton had trouble establishing a tempo in the Trio until a few bars into the section.

At least the audience (thank goodness) didn’t applaud at the Finale’s false ending, thanks perhaps to Atherton’s pronounced pantomiming of the beat.

Stravinsky’s “Petrushka” (1947 version) should have been prime Atherton territory, with its opportunities for driving astringency. Yet the result was a muddle: a loud, often voluptuous yet inconsistent performance that never quite got its structural bearings together.

Atherton would lose himself in the colorful detail, bringing unexpected things to the fore. But his leisurely pacing came at the expense of rhythmic drive, steadiness, and coherence within each tableau.

Indeed, matters sometimes bordered on the eccentric; the pounding dance in the final tableau kept getting slower and heavier as it went, leading to an agonizingly crawling chase. Also, Atherton insisted on using the abrupt concert ending rather than seeing the saga of Petrushka through to its quiet conclusion--always an unsatisfying way to close things out.

Maybe next time. . . .