Cellist Landauer Encounters Old Friend in Mozart Classical

Mozart Classical Orchestra principal cellist Vage Ayrikian was scheduled to step forward as soloist on the orchestra’s Sunday afternoon program at St. Andrew’s Presbyterian Church, but illness forced him to cancel. So, with two days’ notice, Timothy Landauer stepped in to save the day.

The resulting program was a bit shorter than planned; after all, no substitute could be expected to learn music director Ami Porat’s newly reconstructed realization of a Vivaldi sonata so quickly. So that piece was dropped.

That made Haydn’s Cello Concerto in C, a staple in the repertory for that instrument, the centerpiece of the concert. And in Landauer’s hands, it shone as a vehicle for showmanship and personal statement.

Playing from memory, Landauer, the Pacific Symphony’s principal, embraced the work with the familiarity of an intimate, delving into it with confidence and authority, attacking its whirlwind passages with assurance, caressing its singing lines with visceral intensity. The orchestra lent thoughtful, if comparatively timid, accompaniment.

Flanking the concerto were two examples of mid-18th century Viennese symphonic writing: Leopold Hofmann’s Sinfonia in F and Haydn’s Symphony No. 49 in F minor.

The first, the product of a church-choir leader and court organist, provided a glimpse into galant style, in all its polite elegance. This example betrayed no innovation, but it did display an attractive measure of charm, particularly in the tidy and energetic reading Porat’s group gave it.

The last, Haydn’s symphony--subtitled “La passione” and representative of his Sturm-und-Drang style--emerged more mundane than dramatic, firmly anchored to the ground in a pleasant but uninspired performance that bristled with strong statement but left subtleties aside.

As encore, the strings wooed their audience with a syrupy arrangement, by Porat, of the Adagio from Borodin’s String Quartet No. 2 in D.