Redwood Symphony opens its season with distinction

But the music was full of good Prokofiev tunes whether they were in a familiar setting or not. This was a lively performance on the firm rhythmic platform which ballet music needs. The playing started out somewhat sketchy, but this nonprofessional orchestra quickly picked up the pace, becoming less wobbly and more full of character, particularly in the plentiful conspicuous parts for winds and brass.

The big and heavy numbers, the “Dance of the Knights” and what’s known in the reassembled suite as “The Death of Tybalt,” were full-bodied and emphatic. In the latter I rather lost track of which of four numbers in this version we were supposed to be in. The program note description turned fuzzy at this point also. In his preconcert talk, Eric K had promised supertitles so listeners could keep up with where the performance was, but there were no supertitles.

The Prokofiev was preceded by Joan Tower’s “Fanfare for the Uncommon Woman” No. 1 (she later wrote several more of them). This brief piece for brass and percussion resembles Aaron Copland’s famous “Fanfare for the Common Man” about as much as its title resembles Copland’s title. They’re both bold and emphatic, but Tower’s piece is faster and jumpier, with dotted rhythms and more cross-talk. It ends with a brief percussion tattoo. It would fit well with the clanging and frisky “Folk Dance” from “Romeo and Juliet.”

The other half of the program was Beethoven’s Piano Concerto No. 4 in G, Op. 58. This performance had the same continual lively energy as the Prokofiev. It was charming and perky enough to suggest that Beethoven was still writing in a Mozartean-style as late as this work from 1806.

The soloist was Tamami Honma, whose international fame doesn’t drown out her reputation as a beloved local performer. She’s played a cycle of the complete Beethoven piano sonatas in South Bay local venues, which she’s gone on to record. It will be released on Naxos next year. She plays concertos with local orchestras on all levels: on Oct. 15 she’ll be playing the exceedingly rare and quite enormous Ferruccio Busoni Piano Concerto with the Saratoga Symphony. That should be worth hearing.

The performers’ approach to Beethoven was best illustrated by the concerto’s central Andante con moto movement. This is a dialogue between a gruff orchestra and a gentle piano. This orchestra was pretty subdued for an ensemble that had just gotten out of the violence of Prokofiev’s “Romeo and Juliet.” It was brisk and succinct rather than fierce. Honma kept her gentle and soft role sometimes uncannily quiet. Still, she gave strong attacks to her notes in the detached, precise style she used throughout the concerto. When the piano and orchestra were playing together — which they did a lot more of in the outer movements than in the Andante — Honma kept enough firmness in her notes never to be overwhelmed by the orchestral sound.

Redwood Symphony’s next performance will be a Halloween family concert on the afternoon of Sunday, Oct. 29, featuring plenty of exciting movie music by John Williams. The next regular concert, on Nov. 18, features Nikolai Rimsky-Korsakov’s exotic “Scheherazade” and the Jean Sibelius Violin Concerto with Jassen Todorov, plus an overture by the noted 20th century African American composer William Grant Still.