Delfs Meets Mozart; L.A. Can Celebrate

It happens every so often. The stars line up. A shaft of light. And seemingly out of nowhere comes a bit of Mozart. Then, for a fleeting moment, all can seem right in the world.

Such is the moment. Thursday night the Los Angeles Philharmonic began its two-week More Than Mozart Festival, and Amadeus addicts in need of an extra strong dose might try a visit to the Dorothy Chandler Pavilion on Sunday for a matinee repeat of the Philharmonic’s Mozart program followed by Los Angeles Opera’s “Magic Flute” in the evening. If you can stomach Tom Hulse as the cackling boy genius, 20 more minutes of “Amadeus” were delivered to the movie theaters last week.

The Mozart portion of the Philharmonic’s Thursday program included two symphonies and concert arias; the “more” was the premiere of a new piece by a young composer, Theodore Shapiro. The conductor was Andreas Delfs, the Milwaukee Symphony’s music director who next season assumes the directorship of the St. Paul Chamber Orchestra. He is new to the Philharmonic and impressive.

It is often said that stick technique is not everything in a conductor: There are any number of ways, some downright mysterious, of communicating to an orchestra. But technique certainly helps, and the first impression Delfs makes is of a conductor in thrilling command of the essentials.

He presided over a moderate-size orchestra (not period-instrument small but by no means the full Philharmonic), energetically urging--and spectacularly getting--flexible, exciting playing.

The sprightly “Haffner” Symphony, which opened the program, was fast and leaped forth with a spring in its step, a smile on its face and a touch of attitude (maybe even a cackle or two). And it went by in no time; Delfs doesn’t have patience for many of the traditional repeats that added to the sense of momentum.

The heavier Symphony No. 40, which closed the program, was given necessary additional weight but not very much. Again, there were a deftness of touch, a rhythmic precision, a fine sense of dynamic gradations, a sense that the Philharmonic could turn on a dime and, most important, a flair for dramatic urgency that kept familiar music fresh.

There are conductors who flesh out slow movements more than Delfs does. But the sheer magnetic vitality he gave to the pulsing eighth notes in the Andante had the effect of a living heartbeat. Everything was alive.

Mozart has been good to the Philharmonic in other ways lately. Two weeks ago, the orchestra borrowed the Tamino from L.A. Opera’s “Magic Flute” when a tenor scheduled to appear got sick. On this occasion, soprano Andrea Rost--who sang the concert arias “Bella mia fiamma ... Resta, oh Cara” and “Nehmt meinen Dank”--is the production’s Pamina.

In the first aria, Mozart’s intensely emotional response to a conventional text, the Hungarian soprano sounded pressed, a sports car straining in too high a gear. But in the gracious, ever so slightly feminist, second aria, she came into her own when she threw in elaborate ornamentations in the second stanza.

The eternal freshness of Mozart invites new music, especially lively new music by young composers. Shapiro (pronounced Sha-PIE-row) is just that, a 29-year-old who has already made a name for himself in film (he scored the recent David Mamet films “State and Main” and “Heist”).

For his 18-minute “Chambers,” a co-commission from the Philharmonic and the St. Paul Chamber Orchestra, the composer originally meant the score as a response to his New York neighborhood on Chambers Street and his move to Los Angeles for a year.

He had intended it, he writes in the program notes, as a happy portrait of the city in the first two movements and a fond look back from his new home across the country. Sept. 11 happened just after he moved West and married and just as he was finishing the work. Fondness took on solemnity.

“Chambers” shows why Shapiro has had success in film. His musical ideas are more friendly than original--the snappy Scherzo movement in the middle is “West Side Story”-like--he develops them with ease, and he is a clever and skillful orchestrator.

Pleasant melodic phrases colorfully presented in the first movement are transformed in the last into suspended falling scales which, with the help of glassy orchestrations, create the sense of being suspended in space.

That movement is effective moody accompaniment to something unsaid, but I kept waiting for something to be said, some other layer. The climax is the only overt reference to Sept. 11, and it is nicely handled in a Mahlerian way, a surprise but also a release of tension.

Shapiro was lucky to have Delfs lead the premiere. The performance was secure, alert and focused, generously giving the composer the benefit of the doubt.

The Los Angeles Philharmonic repeats its first More Than Mozart program Sunday, 2:30 p.m., $12-$78, Dorothy Chandler Pavilion, 135 N. Grand Ave. (323) 850-2000.