String Soloists Bring La Jolla’s SummerFest to a Bright Close With Vivaldi’s Lively ‘Seasons’

Five violinists--five of the most brilliant and musical fiddlers performing internationally--and two cellists, with a small, 17-member orchestra, earned the cheering that went on, almost from the beginning, at the final concert of SummerFest La Jolla 2001.

At the end of a hectic, 35-event, three-week festival, it was an appropriately bright closing.

The climax of the Sunday afternoon event in Sherwood Auditorium at the San Diego Museum of Contemporary Art was a fleet, expressive and handsomely reconsidered performance of Vivaldi’s four-concerto set “The Seasons,” in which the violin soloists were Margaret Batjer, Adele Anthony, Cho-Liang Lin (the new artistic director of the festival) and Gil Shaham. This was neither a competition nor a marathon, yet it contained the excitement of both.

Batjer--concertmaster of the Los Angeles Chamber Orchestra--performing in “Spring,” Tasmanian violinist Anthony in “Summer,” Lin in “Autumn” and Shaham in “Winter” all achieved virtuosic and musical feats of concentrated expressivity in this most familiar of works, and with a refreshing sense of newness and ease.

Each soloist gave Vivaldi’s many challenging details perfect focus and genuine probing, but without strain or effort. And the music sang forth exquisitely.

The entire afternoon unfolded in much the same way.

At the beginning, there were two other Vivaldi works--first the B-minor Concerto for Four Violins, in which the soloists were Shaham, Batjer, Anthony and Ilya Gringolts, a starry quartet that played together with the finesse and ease of old and devoted colleagues, and the Concerto in G minor for Two Cellos, in which the two soloists were Ralph Kirshbaum and Felix Fan.

The climax to the first half came with Bach’s Concerto for Two Violins, BWV 1043, a chestnut by now but welcome in a new roasting by the admirable team of Shaham and Anthony.

The bonus after intermission was Anthony Newman, the indispensable harpsichordist of the afternoon, who read the poems for “The Seasons” with droll understatement.