L.A. Chamber Orchestra Plays Vital Mendelssohn

After a long period when they seemed largely relegated to community orchestras, Mendelssohn’s symphonies are making a comeback with the best professional ensembles. Friday, his “Scottish” Symphony, No. 3, was the climax of the Los Angeles Chamber Orchestra’s dazzling season-opener under principal conductor Iona Brown at Veterans Wadsworth Theater.

We don’t usually think of Mendelssohn symphonies as display pieces for virtuoso orchestras, but the composer always needed lots of notes, whether working toward fury or repose, and the Chamber Orchestra played all of them here cleanly and passionately, across a wide dynamic range. Brown led a clearly well-rehearsed performance, rich in musical detail and emotional sweep.

Such thrilling collective virtuosity indicates high levels of individual achievement and musicianship. To prove the point, principal trumpet David Washburn stepped forward at concerto time to deliver a gleaming, patrician, stylistically neutral account of the Haydn Trumpet Concerto in E-flat. Brown accompanied him with matching elegance in a buoyant reading that revived all the charm of this much-used piece.

These days, Prokofiev’s “Classical” Symphony is usually taken as a matter for feathery speed. In their opening, Brown and Co. proposed a countervailing model of rare substance and articulate inner life. More expansive tempos, particularly in the first two movements, gave the piece room to breathe and to dance with grace rather than desperation. Then, as if to prove that they could race with the fleetest, the ensemble finished with a finale of blazing brilliance.