California Philharmonic Makes Ambitious Debut

The newest orchestra in the area may not be the most accomplished or exciting, but it is surely the fastest-growing. Although first organized to perform for local appearances of the Prague Festival Ballet in 1995, the California Philharmonic Orchestra has come from the vague vision of a handful of directors this past January to an ambitious concert debut before 2,657 alfresco diners Saturday at the Los Angeles County Arboretum in Arcadia.

Not surprising, there were a few glitches, mostly concerning parking and handling extraneous noise, although the peacocks were a given and the flyovers uncontrollable. For a first-time event, however, the production seemed impressively confident and polished. This inaugural “Festival on the Green” series includes four more Saturday evening performances this summer.

The musical underpinnings proved much more modest in actual achievement. Conducted by Victor Vener, a veteran of the internecine local community orchestra wars and late of the Pasadena Pops Orchestra, the California Philharmonic makes the familiar bright, unintegrated sounds of a professional pickup band, at least as far as the amplification revealed.

Vener unveiled few distinctive ideas about his substantial collection of popular showpieces--Liszt’s “Les Preludes,” Stravinsky’s “Firebird” Suite, Shostakovich’s Festival Overture and Mozart’s Overture to “The Marriage of Figaro”--and displayed a penchant for stodgy tempos and laissez-faire ensemble. His spoken introductions were similarly ponderous and unconvincing.

But Vener’s soloist and concertmaster Armen Anassian, leader of Yanni’s orchestra, did play highly persuasively, well-practiced in technique but spontaneous in spirit in Ravel’s “Tzigane” and Vivaldi’s “Summer” Concerto.