The Pittsburgh New Music Ensemble, under the direction of Kevin Noe, presented a wide and varied program with style and self-confidence at City Theatre on Friday.

Jeffrey Nytch's "Personal Affects" received its premiere performance. Commissioned by the ensemble, Nytch's work was the second of three premieres on the PNME's schedule this summer.

The work was composed for bass clarinet with synthesized material and recorded narration, and Nytch allowed the audience to enter into his delicately musical readings of three poems by Mary Oliver ("The Poet with His Face in His Hands"), Henri Cole ("Gravity and Center") and Edward Hirsch ("Self-Portrait").

The wide range of Kevin Schempf's bass clarinet, projected against an electronically processed backdrop of ambient shimmers, waves of static and occasional rumblings, set the tone and introverted perspective for each poem's recorded narrative.

Nytch's combination of the three poems into a single work created an austere narrative arc of self-discovery and personal reconciliation.

Carnegie Mellon University composer Reza Vali's "Folk Songs, Set No. 9," a series of eight vignettes, was thoughtfully played with appropriate and varying degrees of intimacy and vigor by flutist Lindsey Goodman and guest cellist Kathryn Bates.

It was a treat to hear the complete set of Vali's mix of authentic folk songs (based on existing Persian folk material) and "imaginary" folk songs (music of Reza's own invention, composed in the style of Persian folk songs).

Veteran PNME audiences heard the second and eighth folk songs in 2002 as musical interludes between complete pieces by other composers. Orianna Webb's "Sequence Dreams" and Judah Adashi's "Eight Haiku" filled that role on Friday's performance.

Before any PNME concert, I am always curious to find out which compositions will be performed as interludes between the featured works. Two movements from Webb's five movement "Sequence Dreams" introduced the works of Vali and Nytch. Featuring violinist Miki-Sophia Cloud, "Village Dance" allowed the ensemble to comically portray Webb's incorporation of blown beer bottles as accompaniment (a subtle tie-in to the tapped crystal glasses in Vali's duo).

Webb's second movement, "Dream Sequence," introduced Nytch's commissioned work. Cloud achieved a silky and pure tone as she and percussionist David Skidmore realized Webb's introspective and fragmentary vision.

Interlude compositions at PNME concerts do not always receive the applause they deserve (usually because of quick segues into another work), but Webb's music deservedly broke that pattern. The two movements played left me wanting to hear the rest of this piece in particular and more of Webb's music in general.

The night however, belonged to percussionist David Skidmore. Opening the concert with Steve Mackey's "Micro-Concerto," Skidmore showed off his virtuosic technical skills and musicality (despite some minor balance issues with the rest of the ensemble in the forte moments). In the final work on the program, Jennifer Higdon's "Zaka," he showed a flair for theatrical movements, seemingly dancing behind his marimba as he executed Higdon's dramatic glissandos.

Lighting director Andrew David Ostrowski effectively mimicked all of the musically dramatic changes in each piece, including the performance of Stefan Freund's "Dodecaphunphrolic." Freund's title loosely translates to "frolic and fun with 12 notes." The ensemble and the audience certainly had fun with this piece and the entire concert.