WEST VALLEY SYMPHONY at Granger High School, Stephen Baker conducting, Saturday evening, one night only.
The West Valley Symphony will never be mistaken for the Utah Symphony -- it is very much a community orchestra, with plenty of out-of-tune notes, muffed passages and the occasional blat from the brass section.Nevertheless, the volunteer group that plays for fun and the love of playing serves a valuable purpose, and it filled that role with gusto Saturday night.
Many of the deep performances of the Utah Symphony, tailored to the musical intelligentsia, would bore Joe Average to tears. The West Valley Symphony is much more user-friendly, playing easily accessible tunes from composers such as Strauss and Mendelssohn, movie soundtracks and even the occasional pop tune.
Witness its performance of "When I Fall In Love" Saturday. Or the main theme from the movie "Somewhere in Time" -- a favorite of the orchestra's.
It's Music Education 101, as it were. Mix in a few straight classical pieces with the other stuff and the audience comes away educated without even knowing it.
Even though the West Valley Symphony is a community orchestra, with all of a community orchestra's foibles, Saturday's was a fine performance.
The orchestra played extremely well -- outdoing itself, really. The renditions weren't perfect, but they were almost completely free of the obvious, standout mistakes that jerk the audience's attention from listening to the selection to, "Oo, didja hear that?"
The evening began energetically with Leroy Anderson's fast-moving "Fiddle Faddle." While simple in structure, it allows the orchestra to show off its skill with various rapid passages, which the musicians pulled off with aplomb. "Syncopated Clock" ran along the same lines.
It was clear the orchestra enjoyed playing "Fiddle Faddle," to the point that it repeated it for its encore. One of the most fun parts of the evening was watching bassist Bill Bailey bob his head and move his body and instrument to the rhythm.
The highlight of the concert came at the end of the first half, with Mendelssohn's overture to "The Marriage of Camacho." The piece is a good, solid, meaty classical tune that nonetheless contains straightforward melody and harmonies, making it relatively easy to play, and easier for the uneducated ear to hear and appreciate.
It was a nice fit for the orchestra, which did a very nice job with it.
Another high point was the last number of the regular program, the overture to Johann Strauss' "Die Fledermaus." Strauss is a fun composer, and the overture, with its repeated switches from fast 4/4 time to waltz, delivers.
At $5 a pop, the West Valley Symphony concerts don't break the bank, and Saturday's performance was well worth that modest investment.