A Masterful Season Opener by the Long Beach Symphony

Launching her 11th and valedictory season as music director of the Long Beach Symphony on Saturday night, JoAnn Falletta led the orchestra in a bright demonstration of its measurable achievement and her considerable mastery. The challenging program reached its peak in a brilliant, mellow and deeply touching performance of Brahms’ First Symphony.

The refurbished Terrace Theater at the Long Beach Performing Arts Center held a capacity audience for this beginning of the orchestra’s 65th season. Not only Brahms, but music by John Luther Adams--the Alaska-based composer, not the better-known Northern California musician--and Prokofiev gave these listeners genuine substance.

Adams’ engrossing “The Time of Drumming” captured their interest immediately. Though the composer categorizes the piece as “Eskimo-inspired rock ‘n’ roll,” it is actually a through-composed series of minimalist riffs utilizing all parts of the symphonic apparatus to build a lively climax, 11 minutes after its start. Falletta & Co. made it irresistible.

Even more compelling, Brahms’ First at the other end of the evening sounded its many beauties with a patina of musical inevitability clearly caused by the guiding intelligence on the podium. Falletta’s special combination of leadership skills will surely be hard to replace when she moves on.

At midprogram, Andre-Michel Schub gave great pleasure in his efficient playing of Prokofiev’s Third Piano Concerto, though the total performance had rough spots and recurring moments of jagged synchronicity. All Schub--and his listeners--needed was more intensity and greater vehemence to make the piece more interesting.