POPS REVIEW : Everly Keeps Predictable Russian Program Sharp : Music: For the most part, the San Diego Symphony orchestra responded favorably to his precise baton.

Devoting an evening to Russian Romantic music is as traditional a SummerPops feature as the ubiquitous popping of champagne corks. In lesser hands, the Russian theme is an excuse for bombast and melodic bathos. Fortunately, Jack Everly does not leave his good taste at home when he conducts the San Diego Symphony. The wiry young guest conductor who made his local debut at last season’s SummerPops did not hesitate to add a witty Stravinsky selection to Wednesday night’s predictable lineup of Glinka, Borodin, Rachmaninoff, Rimsky-Korsakov and Tchaikovsky.

Because Everly is principal conductor of the American Ballet Theatre, it is not surprising that his calling card is a taut rhythmic vitality that infuses every score. For the most part, the orchestra responded favorably to Everly’s precise, authoritative baton, delivering this colorful repertory with verve and cohesive ensemble. By the time the concert ended with the final act from Tchaikovsky’s “Swan Ballet,” however, the otherwise laudable ensemble began to fray at the edges.

William Wolfram, a confident young American pianist of formidable technique--he won a bronze medal in Moscow’s 1986 International Tchaikovsky Competition--gave a solid, albeit soberly literal, account of Rachmaninoff’s Second Piano Concerto. (For some odd reason, Everly programmed only the first and last movements of the concerto, omitting its deliciously decadent middle movement.) Bold and sure in the concerto’s extroverted sections, Wolfram understated the quieter moments, giving them a certain intimacy but robbing them of their emotional charge. And his portion of the Allegro Scherzando lacked the playful character that animates the concerto’s finale.

In contrast to Wolfram’s urbane objectivity, Everly properly indulged the work’s heart-on-the-sleeve rubatos and subtle shadings. After all, once you’ve ordered a jumbo banana split, it’s too late to save calories by asking for imitation whipped cream.

Everly opened the concert with Glinka’s Overture to “Russlan and Ludmilla,” which was aptly bright but never brash. His reading of Prokofiev’s familiar march from the opera “The Love for Three Oranges” sounded jaunty if slightly strident. Borodin’s “In the Steppes of Central Asia” never quite took hold, but the first movement of Rimsky-Korsakov’s “Scheherazade” developed grandly under Everly’s sympathetic direction and the shapely solos from several first-chair woodwinds.

Without comment, Everly substituted Borodin’s “Polovtsian Dances” from the opera “Prince Igor” for the scheduled orchestral transcription of Balakirev’s “Islamey” Oriental Fantasy. Three short movements from Kabalevsky’s suite from “The Comedians” sparkled with their customary kitschy allure. Stravinsky’s coda from the ballet “Apollo” displayed just the right proportion of lyrical charm, acerbic counterpoint and mild, jazz-inspired rhythmic influences.

The Embarcadero Marina Park South audience numbered 1,780. Tonight and Saturday, Everly returns to the podium with a program of musical theater selections.