Two Pittsburgh premieres stood at the center of Tuesday night's Pittsburgh Symphony Chamber Orchestra concert. In the final concert of its season, PSO concertmaster and conductor Andres Cardenes brought the ensemble to Bellefield Hall Auditorium on the Pitt campus. Framed by Vivaldi's Concerto in C Major for Two Trumpets and Beethoven's Symphony No. 8, the concert featured city premieres of a transcription of Rimsky-Korsakov's "Capriccio Espagnol" for nine instruments and Alan Shulman's enlarged orchestration of "Theme and Variations."

Violist Tatjana Mead Chamis brought out the poignancy in Alan Shulman's "Theme and Variations." Click photo for larger image.

Putting the chamber in chamber orchestra, the most interesting work of the concert was a significantly paired down orchestration of Rimsky-Korsakov's "Capriccio Espagnol." Transcribed from a full orchestral complement to nine instruments by American composer Easley Blackwood, the familiar work was expertly presented by the smallest ensemble of the night. Playing with the outward coolness characteristic of the PSO, the musicians' physical nonchalance belied the difficulty of the arrangement.

Each player, without the comfort of sectional support, showed a virtuosic ability to make quick shifts in their specific instrumental role as the composition progressed.

At times sounding like a much larger ensemble (a credit to Mr. Blackwood), the nonet was able to achieve subtle rubatos and maintain an excellent aural balance nearly throughout. The absence of percussion in Blackwood's transcription, a vital element to Rimsky-Korsakov's original, was made less apparent by the piano playing of CMU student Rodrigo Ojeda, cellist Anne Martindale Williams and bassist Jeffrey Turner.

Completing the ensemble were Louis Lev (violin), Damian Bursill-Hall (flute), Thomas Thompson (clarinet), David Sogg (bassoon), Stephen Kostyniak (horn) and George Vosburgh (trumpet).

Violist Tatjana Mead Chamis and conductor Andres Cardenes led the full string section through Alan Shulman's "Theme and Variations." The composer's son, Jay Shulman, introduced the work, written in 1940, with a recounting of his father's musical career. The audience learned that the tune for these variations came to the composer while he was riding the subway from Brooklyn to New York.

Originally written as a duo for viola and piano, Shulman's later orchestration for viola, strings and harp allowed for greater musical clarity of the accompanying instruments' passing chromatic inflections. At moments reminiscent of Hindemith's "Trauermusik," Shulman's variations created a strong vehicle to display the viola's ability to bring out poignant melodic expressions. Chamis eloquently captured the mood of each variation, making her viola speak clearly and articulately through the athletic writing of the fifth and seventh variations. Her singing style maintained an exquisite tonal consistency from the instrument's lowest string to its upper reaches.

Trumpeters George Vosburgh and Neal Berntsen opened the concert with Vivaldi's Concerto in C Major for Two Trumpets. The soloists matched their timbres throughout and smoothly traded phrases. Cardenes brought out the dynamic contrasts and humorous interruptions in Beethoven's Eighth Symphony, convincingly capturing the work's Haydn-esque qualities.