At the last minute, I decided to attend a Louisiana Philharmonic (known as
La Phil) concert and heard the following program:

Mozart: Symphony No. 38 "Prague"
Rachmaninoff: Rhapsody on a Theme of Paganini
Beethoven: Symphony No. 8

all conducted by Klauspeter Seibel.

Seibel is a wonderful musician.  He certainly deserves more recognition
and a better class of orchestra than La Phil.  It gripes me no end that
a dud like Levine gets fabulous gigs and Seibel is reduced to journeyman.
On the other hand, I get to hear him live.  He's done wonders with La Phil,
certainly a professional orchestra and always capable of a surprisingly
good performance, but with Seibel, more consistent.

Seibel has often surprised me in his reading of warhorses, poking me to
see them in new ways.  This program qualified on all three counts.  The
surprise this time was the Mozart.  I've always loved this symphony, but
Seibel made it fizz like champagne, and the orchestra played almost at the
level of Szell and the Cleveland and *their* Mozart.

The other great source of pleasurable surprise was the Rachmaninoff
soloist, Faina Lushtak, head of the piano department at Tulane.  She played
the bejabbers out of a fairly flashy piece to begin with, showing great
rhythmic elan (she swung!) and a dazzling command of color.  Each note was
cleanly articulated and yet part of a long line.  In short, she played
better than many a better-known soloist.  I think she records on Centaur,
but I've had problems trying to locate an on-line retailer for her.

By the way, when Seibel asked her what she wanted to play, her choice was
the Chopin second, but apparently Seibel hates that piece.  Good man.
Sound.

Steve Schwartz