Rewards Beyond the Regimen

A conductor in a conniption once defined a symphony orchestra as "a menagerie of geniuses." To capture and keep these restless creatures has never been a simple matter, and in recent years they have displayed a growing tendency to burst out of their gilded but confining cages. Wearied by the iron regimen and routine of orchestra life, front-rank instrumentalists have defected by the dozens to the concert circuit and university faculties. Money is not the issue. They are not looking for bigger paychecks; they want a richer musical life. How to satisfy this craving is one of the principal problems facing today's big orchestras.

Tree of Sound. The Boston Symphony has hit upon a likely solution. As in every orchestra, many of the Boston musicians have tried to balance their heavy symphonic diet with doses of chamber music, slipping off like addicts in need of a fix to play where and however they can. The progressive Boston management decided that rather than discourage the practice, as some orchestras have done, it would cultivate it. The result is the Boston Symphony Chamber Players ("The Boschaps"), organized a year ago and made up of the orchestra's first-desk players. It is the first such group ever sponsored by a major U.S. orchestra, and the resounding success of its opening season has established what promises to be a trend-setting precedent.

Last week the Boschaps performed a rich, tastefully executed program at Manhattan's Town Hall. In Benjamin Britten's Fantasy for Oboe and Strings, the trio of strings spun delicately interlocking webs around the oboe's sober solo; Francis Poulenc's sprightly Sonata for Horn, Trumpet and Trombone was charmingly carried off like the playful banterings of back-fence gossips. The evening's major piece, Schubert's String Quintet in C, grew out of the stage like a tree of sound, alive and shapely in every line. The musicians played as it is seldom possible in full orchestra: with all the color and nuance their instruments could yield, with their hearts in their hands.

Well Tuned. That the Boschaps succeed so well is not surprising. They are, after all, among the world's finest symphony musicians. And, unlike most solo virtuosos, they are well tuned in the art of ensemble playing. Indeed, each of the top dozen or so U.S. orchestras has a first-rate group there for the organizing. Following Boston's lead, the Chicago Symphony this season inaugurated a similar series of nine chamber-music concerts; five have been held so far, and all have been sellouts. If the trend develops, the music public can hardly lose; neither can the orchestras. As Boston Symphony President Henry Cabot observes: "Our job is to make music around this neck of the woods, and the more music we have, the better off we are."

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