Fine Tuning

Long before appearing in public, musicians spend thousands of hours taking lessons and practicing alone to perfect their art. Even when they become professionals, they continue this isolated but necessary work.

More hours go into group rehearsals, when the instrumentalists finally come together to prepare for an audience, as members of the Pacific Symphony did this week for two programs at the Orange County Performing Arts Center in Costa Mesa.

Pacific concertmaster Raymond Kobler played Erich Wolfgang Korngold’s Violin Concerto in D with the orchestra, led by music director Carl St.Clair. A native of Vienna, Korngold was one of the founders of the Hollywood movie “sound” and composed scores for such swashbuckling epics as “The Sea Hawk” and “The Adventures of Robin Hood.”

Korngold shared the program with three other composers associated with Vienna--Mozart, Strauss and Anton Webern. Three of the four used the standard classical orchestra of varying size, but Webern’s “Five Pieces for Orchestra” required some instruments not typically part of an orchestra’s makeup--such as a guitar and a mandolin. Webern also used cowbells, celesta and harmonium, but rarely all at once and actually with great subtlety.

Anyone hanging around backstage at the center before the concert would see many of the musicians arriving an hour or so before the official call--usually 7 p.m. for concerts beginning at 8--to check out and prepare their instruments, warm up their fingers or their lips, and go over music parts or copy phrase markings into their scores.

Suiting up in tuxedos and knotting bow ties comes next, which might be the easiest part of their preparation before stepping in front of the limelight, where all those hours of hard work pay off.