A Premiere and a Rarity in Long Beach

A glance at the program--after frantically trying to get through the Convention Center’s rodeo overruns and Grand Prix roadblocks--might suggest that the Long Beach Symphony had offered Wagnerian bookends Saturday at the Terrace Theater.

Wrong.

Hagen’s “Fire Music,” the curtain raiser, had nothing whatever to do with “The Ring.” Rather, it is a new orchestra commission, and its composer, Wisconsin-born Daron Aric Hagen, can take pride in the result.

He can also celebrate the sterling premiere performance it received at the hands of JoAnn Falletta and her vibrant band.

Tonal, except for a brief middle section of aural splurts and splotches, it is a big, bold, glittery affair built on multifaceted techniques and nods to Bartokian rhythms here, Janacek brass there, a lush, melodic string line elsewhere, moments of clever counterpoint and complex manipulation of harmonies against a kaleidoscope of muted figurations.

In between “Fire Music” and orchestral excerpts from Wagner’s “Tristan,” “Walkure” and “Gotterdammerung” came a welcome rarity, Victor Herbert’s Cello Concerto No. 2, played by Sharon Robinson.

With its fin-de-siecle allure, softly gleaming salon nostalgia and reminiscences of a small-scale Richard Strauss, it comes across as sophisticated schmaltz.

Falletta and cohorts rose to the challenge, but Robinson could not erase memories of Lynn Harrell’s stellar Music Center performance a couple of seasons ago.