A balancing act with versatility, virtuosity

Classical-era elegance, a brand-new, Ivesian sound collage and the colorful splashiness of Richard Strauss’ “Rosenkavalier” Suite: Carl St.Clair and the Pacific Symphony set a nicely balanced agenda for their second program of the season.

Wednesday night’s performance in Segerstrom Hall at the Orange County Performing Arts Center (which was repeated Thursday) displayed the versatility of the orchestra -- and the conductor -- in these disparate challenges.

The well-loved American pianist Andre Watts dominated the first half with a focused and sweeping reading of Beethoven’s Third Piano Concerto, which he substituted on two weeks’ notice for the announced Brahms B-flat Concerto.

After a diffident opening movement, Watts began to probe the work’s substantive content -- his playing of slow movements has always been his strongest suit -- and he brought to the finale a magisterial grace as well as the most solid technical ease. At this point in a now 40-year career, this pianist’s trills may be the most purling and effortless in the business. But always within strict stylistic confines.

St.Clair & Co. assisted most persuasively. They preceded the concerto with a bracing and dynamically contrasting rendition of Beethoven’s “Egmont” Overture that established the tone for the evening.

Paul Seiko Chihara’s “Morning Dances” for large orchestra, which followed intermission, was commissioned by the Pacific Symphony and offers provocative sound entertainment through 14 minutes of shifting landscapes and moods.

This is stream-of-consciousness meandering, ever episodic but emotionally cumulative, in a mostly tonal, sometimes bluesy, always fascinating style that uses the entire symphonic apparatus deftly. Before the performance, Chihara described the piece as “joyous ... with an edge,” and that does justice to a work that combines hedonism, whimsy and a spiritual component in an unforced way. The prominent trumpet soloist was Barry Perkins.

Balancing Beethoven with Strauss, St.Clair and his virtuosic orchestra brought the concert to a climax with a rousing and multifaceted reading of the exposing, and overexposed, Suite from “Der Rosenkavalier.”

The playing was clear, focused, tightly balanced. Without exaggeration or overemphasis, St.Clair found all the grace, ebullience, charm and restraint in a piece we have come to know too well. It was revelatory. The fortissimos resounded mightily, and the very quiet passages gave emotional resonance to the composer’s make-believe world. With good reason, there was cheering at the end.