Pacific Plans Four Premieres : Music: Among the offerings in Costa Mesa will be a new orchestration of Mussorgsky's 'A Night on Bald Mountain' in December.

Pacific Plans Four Premieres : Music: Among the offerings in Costa Mesa will be a new orchestration of Mussorgsky’s ‘A Night on Bald Mountain’ in December.

By CHRIS PASLES

March 3, 1994 12 AM PT

TIMES STAFF WRITER

A new orchestration of Mussorgsky’s “A Night on Bald Mountain” will be one of four world premieres during the Pacific Symphony’s 1994-95 season, announced Wednesday.

The others will be the previously announced Vietnam War commemoration commissioned by the orchestra from Elliott Goldenthal, and two pieces by the orchestra’s composer-in-residence, Frank Ticheli.

The “Bald Mountain” orchestration will be by clarinetist-composer Daniel Lochrie of the Nashville Symphony, completed as part of his doctoral studies at Ohio State University.

Unlike more familiar orchestrations by Rimsky-Korsakov or Leopold Stokowski (or even a choral-orchestral version by Vissarion Shebalin), Lochrie’s score--according to Pacific music director Carl St.Clair--attempts to be more faithful to Mussorgsky’s own late piano-vocal score, which he intended to orchestrate but did not.

“There are actual note differences (from the other versions),” St.Clair said Wednesday at his home in Turtle Rock. “There’s a devil’s theme that is not present (in the other versions) and thousands of different changes. I think it’s very interesting.”

The Ticheli pieces will include a fanfare to open the season and a major work to be played in May. The fanfare will a “solemn” one, St.Clair said, in keeping with the seriousness of the opening program which includes Mozart’s Requiem and James Hopkins’ “Songs of Eternity.” That piece, first done last year by the Pacific Chorale, was commissioned by a Santa Ana couple in memory of their 26-year-old son who had been killed in a freeway accident.

“I don’t think people realize it,” St.Clair said, “but in the last two seasons we have not done less than 17% contemporary American music. That would surprise even our subscribers. I don’t count it by the number of pieces; I count it by the total minutes of music. And I’m very happy at the response. The audience is always talking about the new pieces.”

Soloists for the season will include violinists Nai-Yuan Hu and Robert McDuffie, and pianists Alain Lefevre, Seung-Un Ha and Horacio Gutierrez.

Hu, first-prize winner in the 1985 Queen Elisabeth International Violin Competition in Belgium, will be playing with the Pacific for the first time. McDuffie played during the 1992-93 season.

Lefevre was the soloist last month for Corigliano’s Piano Concerto, which he and the orchestra are recording for Koch International Classics. Ha played last summer during the orchestra’s outdoor series at the Irvine Meadows Amphitheatre. Guiterrez played with the orchestra in 1989.

Guest conductors will include Maximiano Valdes, music director of the Buffalo Philharmonic since 1989, and George Cleve, who conducted the program with Ha at Irvine Meadows.

All the announced concerts will take place at the Orange County Performing Arts Center in Costa Mesa. The Thursday concerts, for the third consecutive year, will be broadcast live over KUSC-FM (91.5).

The season:

* Oct. 19, 20: Frank Ticheli’s Fanfare; James Hopkins’ “Songs of Eternity”; Mozart’s Requiem (soprano Korliss Uecker; mezzo-soprano Phyllis Pancella; tenor David Hamilton; bass TBA, Pacific Chorale).

* Nov. 16, 17: Debussy’s “Images”; Mozart’s Piano Concerto No. 20 (Seung-Un Ha, soloist; Ravel’s “Bolero.” Maximiano Valdes, conductor.

* Dec. 7, 8: Shostakovich’s “Festival Overture”; Prokofiev’s Violin Concerto No. 2 (Robert McDuffie, soloist); Mussorgsky-Lochrie’s “Night on Bald Mountain”; Suite from Stravinsky’s “Firebird.”

* Feb. 1, 2, 1995: Schubert’s Symphony No. 5; Strauss’ “Till Eulenspiegel”; Rachmaninoff’s Piano Concerto No. 2 (Alain Lefevre, soloist).

* Feb. 22, 23: Mozart’s Symphony No. 40; Mahler’s Symphony No. 4 (Cheryl Parrish, soprano).

* March 29, 30: Ravel’s “Le Tombeau de Couperin”; Lalo’s “Symphonie Espagnole” (Nai-Yuan Hu, violin); Elgar “Enigma Variations.” George Cleve, conductor.

* April 26, 27: Elliott Goldenthal’s commissioned work to memorialize the Vietnam War (soloists TBA, Pacific Chorale).

* May 10, 11: Brahms’ Symphony No. 3; Ticheli commission; Respighi’s “Pines of Rome.”

* May 31, June 1: Beethoven’s Piano Concerto No. 5 (Horacio Gutierrez, soloist); Strauss’ “Ein Heldenleben.”

St.Clair will conduct all concerts except as indicated. Series tickets will go on sale April 1 at prices to be announced. For more information, call (714) 755-5799.