Pop and Music Reviews : Mixed Results in Gershwin Program at Bowl

In the Gershwin program at Hollywood Bowl on Friday, conductor John Mauceri introduced the soloist in “Rhapsody in Blue” as a pianist who “brings improvisational flair” to the piece, just like Gershwin would have done.

What Gershwin might have played on such an occasion is a moot point, since we’ll never know. Certainly pianist Geoff Keezer hit a sequence of notes--intentionally, it was clear, not by error--that at least one listener had never heard before in the piece. But that wasn’t the problem.

Keezer drew an introspective, exploratory, meandering bead on the music, sometimes breaking long phrases into little, step-like patterns or else just throwing them away. Generally, his style of playing sounded anachronistic in this piece, and the result was a wayward, risky but unsatisfying interpretation.

Mauceri labored studiously to follow, watching Keezer like a hawk. But whenever the soloist and the Hollywood Bowl Orchestra had to engage, the gears shifted noticeably, distressingly.

The 22-year-old pianist, who, we were told, is making a big name for himself in the jazz world, returned to play his own brooding interpretation of “My Man’s Gone Now” as an encore. (Saturday, he reportedly played “The Man I Love.”)

Mauceri also led a lively reading of the Overture to “Girl Crazy,” a low-octane, slack account of “An American in Paris” (at times accompanied by off-stage sprinklers) and, after intermission, several spirited selections from “Strike Up the Band.”

The latter enlisted the hard-working song-and-dance team of Beverly Ward and Kirby Ward, (who are married to each other), plus singers: a charmingly imperious Beth Fowler, a piping Louise Edeiken, a properly stuffed-shirt Charles Goff and a vocally strained Jason Workman.

As usual, the title song got most people’s patriotic juices flowing despite its satiric, anti-war profiteering message. The conductor and the six vocalists eventually marched on a runway edged in electric lights that was set behind the first row of boxes. The orchestral shell obliged with red, white and blue lighting. Everyone went delirious.

Mauceri’s conducting often provided visual interest, but unfortunately his gestures didn’t always translate into any differences in what was heard.

Attendance: 12,458 Friday; 16,542 Saturday.