MUSIC REVIEW : Russian National Orchestra Debuts

The hall was filled with the rich, the powerful and the tuxedoed. The soloist was none other than the superstar oddball pianist, Ivo Pogorelich, playing Tchaikovsky’s First Piano Concerto--a welcome change from the Prokofiev Third that he played here in 1981 and ’86.

And yet, the North American debut of the recently formed Russian National Orchestra, conducted by its founder, Mikhail Pletnev, turned out to be, on a rain-besotted Thursday night at Ambassador Auditorium in Pasadena, not very special.

Things improved as the evening wore on, and after the Steinway was removed. Still, these performances did not offer revelations, surprises or symphonic polish in any abundance.

One professional listener left the hall following the last work on the program, well after 10:15; some of those who remained report that the three encores then played became the best part of this long musical event.

Before that, Pletnev’s full-size, string-rich orchestra gave few signs of remarkable accomplishment or virtuosity.

In the first half of the program, the first-desk soloists seemed like low achievers; after intermission, in Tchaikovsky’s Third Suite, they made better, if not thrilling, impressions.

Pletnev, best known until now as a pianist, would seem to be an unshowy, workmanlike conductor.

In the suite, he got good, and sometimes even lush and contrasting, playing from his instrumentalists; in Beethoven’s “Egmont” Overture and the Tchaikovsky Piano Concerto, many imbalances, as well as raggednesses, emerged. These players may be individually strong, but they do not as yet constitute a cohesive body of musicians working consistently toward shared goals.

Always a fascinating interpreter, Pogorelich, as he can, turned in an eccentric performance which told us more about the Belgrade-born pianist than about Tchaikovsky’s beloved B-flat-minor Concerto.

In the concerted portions, Pogorelich’s musical astuteness kept him afloat in a willing, if scrappy, accompaniment.

Left to his own devices in the cadenza-like passages and later in the great, first-movement cadenza itself, the pianist pulled the composer’s musical lines apart, made willful, one might even say perverse, stretchings of tempo and very nearly came to a dead halt in several moments. As a result, and even though the composer will recover, this performance was thus ruined.

In the slow movement, pianist and orchestra produced a few gorgeous moments, but failed to find the fun and playfulness in the scherzando middle-section. Technically unfazable, Pogorelich sailed easily through the finale, though without that sense of catharsis or involvement toward which other pianists aim. However long he may have known or considered this work, it is not yet his, except in the most superficial ways.

The three encores were: Waltz of the Flowers, from Tchaikovsky’s “Nutcracker”; the Spanish Dance from Glazunov’s “Raymonda,” and Tchaikovsky’s “Marche Slave.”

The orchestra, without a soloist, will play at the Orange County Performing Arts Center, Monday at 8 p.m. That program lists Prokofiev’s “Classical” Symphony, Scriabin’s “Poem of Ecstasy” and Tchaikovsky’s Symphony No. 5.