English Chamber Orchestra

Pinchas Zukerman led the English Chamber Orchestra in the kind of music-making that educates the ear and helps set standards in a Philharmonic Society-sponsored concert Friday at the Performing Arts Center. From the initial vibrant yet razor-sharp attacks in Elgar's Introduction and Allegro for strings to the closing crystalline clarity and drive of Haydn's Symphony No. 85, the playing of the orchestra was virtually ideal in terms of balance, shading, transparency, propulsion and nuanced style.

Considering these two recordings together somehow feels like a trap devised by the deliberately provocative Kennedy. "Classic Kennedy" is indeed classic Kennedy, the violinist whose punk look is so '80s and whose new collection of schlock arrangements (many by the violinist himself) of short classical favorites is the kind of atavistic classical and romantic pop mood-music collection you expect to find hawked on late-night TV.

The air was chilly outside Ambassador Auditorium, Pasadena, and within as well, where the English Chamber Orchestra presented the first of its three UK/LA '88 Festival-related concerts on Thursday. The indoors chill related to the orchestra's playing: balanced and tuned to a fault under its principal conductor, Jeffrey Tate, who was making his local debut.

Sometime, and probably sooner rather than later, when Internet radio becomes a practical reality, the classical music universe could expand with a very big bang. To understand why, just hop onto your browser and check the listings of the great national European radio networks. From http://www.bbc.co.

PONCE: "CONCIERTO DEL SUR." VILLA-LOBOS: GUITAR CONCERTO. LAMARQUE-PONS: "CONCERTINO DE INVIERNO." Eduardo Fernandez, guitar, Enrique Garcia Asensio conducting the English Chamber Orchestra. London 421 108-2 (compact disc). Fernandez's playing of the Ponce and Villa-Lobos concertos is clean, slightly cool and interpretively unremarkable. The brief, piquant, percussion-rich 1976 Concertino by Jaures Lamarque-Pons is an attractive and sophisticated addition to the repertory, however, and suavely delivered by Fernandez and Co.

A Royal Song: Prince Charles gave the Queen Mother a special 90th birthday present Thursday--a concert of specially commissioned music. The concert by the English Chamber Orchestra, and a recording to be released by EMI, will benefit Charles' charity, the Prince's Trust, which helps disadvantaged young people. Charles commissioned one of the works by composer Patrick Doyle especially for his grandmother.

After making New York City--and the Metropolitan Opera--his headquarters for most of the last decade, British conductor Jeffrey Tate last year moved back to London to assume his job with English Chamber Orchestra and a similar post, also principal conductor, with the Royal Opera, Covent Garden. "It has been good to get back home," the 44-year-old former opera coach said recently in a telephone interview from a Richmond, Va., tour stop.

It has become a tradition for this column, at this time of year, to recommend some new recording of Handel's "Messiah" to avoid. 1989's Caveat of the Year goes to the version by London's excellent Taverner Choir and period-instrument Taverner Players under the direction of their founder, Andrew Parrott. Among the soloists are such stylistic paragons as soprano Emma Kirkby, countertenor James Bowman and bass David Thomas (EMI Angel 49802, two CDs).

The 1987-88 season of the Ambassador International Cultural Foundation--a season in which the foundation will present more than 150 events at Ambassador and Pasadena Civic Auditoriums in Pasadena--will feature first-time Pasadena appearances by, among others, L'Orchestre de la Suisse Romande, the Moscow Ballet, the Central Philharmonic of China and the Georgian Chamber Orchestra of Tbilisi. It will also offer return engagements by a number of major artists and attractions.

Pinchas Zukerman led the English Chamber Orchestra in the kind of music-making that educates the ear and helps set standards in a Philharmonic Society-sponsored concert Friday at the Performing Arts Center. From the initial vibrant yet razor-sharp attacks in Elgar's Introduction and Allegro for strings to the closing crystalline clarity and drive of Haydn's Symphony No. 85, the playing of the orchestra was virtually ideal in terms of balance, shading, transparency, propulsion and nuanced style.

The English Chamber Orchestra, which made its local debut at Civic Theatre on Wednesday night, failed to give a single clue to its national identity. Austrian orchestras display their velvety warm timbre, for example, and French orchestras usually specialize in the music of their fellow countrymen. But the 33-member London-based orchestra under conductor Pinchas Zuckerman sported a generic, international sonority and offered no British music on its eclectic but unadventurous program.

A Royal Song: Prince Charles gave the Queen Mother a special 90th birthday present Thursday--a concert of specially commissioned music. The concert by the English Chamber Orchestra, and a recording to be released by EMI, will benefit Charles' charity, the Prince's Trust, which helps disadvantaged young people. Charles commissioned one of the works by composer Patrick Doyle especially for his grandmother.

Concertos are not typically conductor's material, but the Beethoven Triple is something of an exception. A noble, quirky amalgam of chamber music and orchestral display, it needs--and seldom gets--a controlling, central vision. The version recorded by Edward Heath and the Trio Zingara a year ago, and recently released on compact disc (IMP Classics, PCD 917), would seem to represent Heath's vision, although the Zingarans certainly make a cohesive collective protagonist.

It has become a tradition for this column, at this time of year, to recommend some new recording of Handel's "Messiah" to avoid. 1989's Caveat of the Year goes to the version by London's excellent Taverner Choir and period-instrument Taverner Players under the direction of their founder, Andrew Parrott. Among the soloists are such stylistic paragons as soprano Emma Kirkby, countertenor James Bowman and bass David Thomas (EMI Angel 49802, two CDs).

Hard-core fiddle fanciers may well rejoice in "Stradivarius On Stage" (tonight at 10:10 on Channel 28). The BBC-TV production--basically a concert with an intermission featurette between each movement--is filled with close-ups of eight instruments by the Cremona master. But the uninitiated should not rely on the program for real information about the luthier or his craft.

Concertos are not typically conductor's material, but the Beethoven Triple is something of an exception. A noble, quirky amalgam of chamber music and orchestral display, it needs--and seldom gets--a controlling, central vision. The version recorded by Edward Heath and the Trio Zingara a year ago, and recently released on compact disc (IMP Classics, PCD 917), would seem to represent Heath's vision, although the Zingarans certainly make a cohesive collective protagonist.

PONCE: "CONCIERTO DEL SUR." VILLA-LOBOS: GUITAR CONCERTO. LAMARQUE-PONS: "CONCERTINO DE INVIERNO." Eduardo Fernandez, guitar, Enrique Garcia Asensio conducting the English Chamber Orchestra. London 421 108-2 (compact disc). Fernandez's playing of the Ponce and Villa-Lobos concertos is clean, slightly cool and interpretively unremarkable. The brief, piquant, percussion-rich 1976 Concertino by Jaures Lamarque-Pons is an attractive and sophisticated addition to the repertory, however, and suavely delivered by Fernandez and Co.

The air was chilly outside Ambassador Auditorium, Pasadena, and within as well, where the English Chamber Orchestra presented the first of its three UK/LA '88 Festival-related concerts on Thursday. The indoors chill related to the orchestra's playing: balanced and tuned to a fault under its principal conductor, Jeffrey Tate, who was making his local debut.