MUSIC REVIEW : Mozart vs. Philharmonia: Wolfgang 1, Band 0

The original instrument Philharmonia Baroque Orchestra, conducted by Nicholas McGegan, returned to the Los Angeles County Museum of Art Bing Theater for its second and final concert of the season. But the Mozart program the orchestra took on--Symphonies 29 and 33, the Flute Concerto, K. 314, and the little “Salzburg” Divertimento K. 136--found it wanting.

True, the band of more than 20 played with the technical accuracy and ingratiatingly nuanced phrasing that has become its trademark. The players’ inability in all but the Divertimento, however, to project substantial dynamic range and tonal variety into the unresponsive hall resulted in a series of readings that routinely marked time instead of illuminating the music.

These shortcomings revealed themselves at the outset in the extrovert Symphony No. 33 (K. 319). Despite some excellent playing from the woodwinds in the burblings of the outer movements, and McGegan’s gnomish gyrations on the podium, the orchestra’s volume control remained stuck at a lackluster medium-loud that failed to capture Mozart’s sense of physical revel.

In the Flute Concerto that followed (Mozart’s reworking of his perky Oboe Concerto), soloist Stephen Schultz, playing on a modern copy of a German wooden flute, circa 1780, attempted a kinder, gentler interpretation. Instead, he came up with a respectable one in which, besides, too many notes were missed.

Leading off the second half, the strings-only Divertimento was as charming as both Mozart and the Philharmonia at its best can be, the performance’s high spirits clearly energizing the large audience, but the Symphony No. 29 concluding the evening returned to the previous, unsatisfactory energy level.

The nearly full house, its size due in part to an ingenious promotion including the giveaway of 500 compact discs, applauded until rewarded by an encore, the last movement of Mozart’s Divertimento K. 138.