Symphony Will Conduct an All-Beethoven Weekend

Spring has sprung and it’s that time again, time to bring on the Beethoven. Since Boris Brott’s arrival as conductor of the Ventura County Symphony more than three years ago, he has shown an affinity for, and a sure way with, the music of Beethoven.

The tradition continues now that Brott heads the New West Symphony. This weekend’s all-Beethoven program, in Thousand Oaks and Oxnard, promises to be the finest regional display of Beethovenia yet, given the new, improved luster of the New West.

Adding to the allure will be a coveted guest appearance of Anton Kuerti--one of the living legends among classical pianists--performing the Piano Concerto No. 4.

Never one to miss a marketing opportunity, the New West has cheekily tapped into the Hollywood machinery and dubbed the concert “Beethoven! The Immortal Beloved.” Just as the release of “Amadeus” put Mozart in the general public eye, the 1994 film “Immortal Beloved” raised consciousness of Beethoven--in the image of the sullen Gary Oldman--and built romantic intrigue around the composer’s “beloved.”

There’s little chance that the lasting legacies of these master composers would be either notably enhanced or tarnished under the heat of movie magic lanterns. Their reputations precede and supersede them.

Beethoven’s Sixth Symphony, the “Pastoral,” a centerpiece of the concert program, is the composer’s nature-loving opus, an idealistic and atmospheric work that openly expresses his profound connection to the Earth.

The composer once wrote, “It is though every tree were speaking to me in the countryside: holy, holy!” Where other music by Beethoven articulates spiritual and mental tumult or romantic angst, the Sixth Symphony is a thing of great natural splendor.

In a further movie-related tie-in, the New West’s program will also feature a reading of letters by Beethoven to his “immortal beloved,” and a self-revealing letter to his brothers, known as the “Heiligenstadt Testament.”

The program also includes “The Prometheus Overture,” from his ballet “The Creatures of Prometheus.”

In short, the subject at the symphony this weekend is Beethoven, in notes, letters and mythology.

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* New West Symphony, with guest pianist Anton Kuerti, 8 p.m. Friday, Thousand Oaks Civic Arts Plaza, 2100 Thousand Oaks Blvd.; 8 p.m. Saturday, Oxnard Civic Performing Arts Center, 800 Hobson Way. $17-$55 in Thousand Oaks; $18-$30 at Oxnard civic center. Call 643-8646.

Finale Time: The Bach Camerata closes its compact-but-intense concert season this week. With its six-concert roster, beginning in February, and performed at the Music Academy of the West, Ventura City Hall and Thousand Oaks Civic Arts Plaza, the Camerata has further demonstrated its status as a significant chamber music entity in the area.

This week’s final concerts feature a program of music by Johann Hummel, Ernst Von Dohnanyi, Bohuslav Martinu and one notable, welcome rerun--Oxnard-based composer Miguel del Aguila’s Wind Quintet No. 2.

A venturesome, yet accessible and ear-pleasing work, del Aguila’s quintet was premiered early last year by the Bach Camerata, which then traveled to Washington last fall to perform it for the prestigious Kennedy Center’s Friedheim Award, which it won. Chalk one up for culture bred in Ventura County.

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* Bach Camerata, tonight, Music Academy of the West, Santa Barbara; Friday, Ventura City Hall, 500 Poli St.; Sunday, Thousand Oaks Civic Arts Plaza’s Forum Theatre , 2100 Thousand Oaks Blvd. All performances at 8 p.m. Tickets are $18. Call 961-0571 in Santa Barbara, (800) 557-BACH elsewhere.