Subtleties Escape the Camerata

IRVINE —  When Mozart toured Europe as a wunderkind, he often appeared as soloist on both harpsichord and violin. With the composer’s birthday coming up Jan. 27, Ami Porat and the Mozart Camerata, as they have for the past several seasons, invited Corey Cerovsek to join them as soloist on piano and violin in a program of four works by Mozart.

At 23, Cerovsek has outgrown his own wunderkind status and, judging by the concert Saturday night at Concordia University, he’s still developing a mature and unique voice. Nevertheless, he proved secure and attentive in the Piano Concerto No. 14 in E-flat and the Fourth Violin Concerto in D.

The printed program indicated that the violin concerto would precede the piano, but Porat wisely reversed the order. Throughout the E-flat Concerto, the orchestra--its volume augmented by the reverberant hall--threatened to drown out any quiet poetics that the pianist might attempt. Only during the final Allegro, when playful echoes between soloist and orchestra make competition impossible, could any unity of concept be made clear.

If there had been any hope that Porat could bring his band to concentrate on subtleties in this piece, the exit of a couple from the front row of the audience, immediately after the first-movement cadenza--Cerovsek played one of the few Mozart left--seemed to dash them.

With no indication of an emergency, the pair walked out calmly, each footstep resounding on bare concrete, while the performers upheld an awkward silence. The following movement required two starts.

The Violin Concerto, in which much of the balance between forces is inherent in the score, fared much better, although the two sides had occasional trouble agreeing on tempos. Here the orchestra mustered crisp accompaniment, while Cerovsek offered a good-natured, often passionate account punctuated by Joachim’s long, romantic cadenzas.

In their work alone, Porat and the Camerata brought bright sound and abundant spirit both to the Overture to “The Impresario” and the “Haffner” Symphony, painting their subjects with bold, broad strokes, but rarely exploring nuance or venturing into quieter dynamic realms.