Music and Dance Reviews : Youth Symphony Showcases 2 Soloists

Never let it be said that Mehli Mehta lacks generosity of spirit.

Sunday night when the venerable maestro led his American Youth Symphony through its fourth concert of the season in Royce Hall at UCLA, he showcased not one but two deserving young artists.

And instead of dedicating the performance to the memory of several recently deceased board directors he added, in tribute, another piece to an already lengthy program, Grieg’s “The Last Spring.”

All of it was heartily appreciated by a capacity audience, which included his famous son Zubin.

Pianist John Novacek, a local resident who studied with the late Jakob Gimpel, made the most of his opportunity in Rachmaninoff’s Rhapsody on a Theme of Paganini. He is a commanding presence at the keyboard, not just because of a sterling technique but also his virile, integrated playing.

Throughout the high-velocity runs, to which he brought a diamond-hard brilliance, there was always more substance than showiness. And in the lyric sections, especially when it came to the famous 18th Variation, he revealed uncommonly poetic depths.

Nor did violinist Sergiu Schwartz disappoint. The Romanian-born Israeli violinist, who has already made a number of previous visits to Southern California, comes equipped with a natural facility. If, in the Mendelssohn Concerto, he did not sustain maximum tension through the agitated passages and opted for the classical rather than heroic approach, his playing was never less than refined, musicianly and sincere, while his tone, with never a squall in evidence, was a thing of utter sweetness.

Mehta accompanied both in his usual attentive, though at times blustery, way. He opened with the elegiac Grieg and closed with Beethoven’s Fourth Symphony, in a reading that was poised, vital, full of love and good-humored bumptiousness.