Scott Cantrell

RICHARDSON – A refreshing program, refreshingly done, opened the Richardson Symphony Orchestra's 2008-2009 season Saturday night. And the most familiar piece of the Eisemann Center concert, the Brahms B-flat major Piano Concerto (No. 2), was the one most filled with surprises.

Most conductors take the opening horn solo rather spaciously, speeding up at the piano's first flourishes. But RSO music director Anshel Brusilow kept it moving, blending seamlessly into pianist Alexandre Moutouzkine's entrance.

This was a good thing, and Mr. Moutouzkine's willingness to vary tempos slightly from one section of the movement to another was valid. But in both the first two movements the pace often felt too deliberate – slower than Brahms' metronome markings – with big chordal passages needing more forward motion.

The slow movement's songful cello solo is usually taken closer to 60 beats per minute than to Brahms' quite mobile 84. But Mr. Brusilow, again to his credit, must have been in the mid-70s, giving the tune an airier flow. Jungshin Lewis played beautifully, but sometimes too loudly.

Mr. Moutouzkine was a contestant in the last two Van Cliburn International Piano competitions. Though he took no top prizes, even as a 20-year-old he was clearly a musician of special sensitivity. Seven years on, he's still growing musically, but everything in his Brahms betokened thought and dedication, and key phrases were lovingly turned.

Mr. Brusilow and the orchestra responded surely to Mr. Moutouzkine's every expressive gesture. This is a part-time ensemble, but with principal players that include University of North Texas professors, standards are thoroughly professional. Mr. Brusilow isn't the most outwardly expressive conductor, but he's a seasoned pro.

The Hindemith Symphonic Metamorphosis on Themes by Carl Maria von Weber was smartly done, with taut contributions from the brasses. Some blotches on high violin writing betrayed the orchestra's only noticeable weakness. The rarely-played Schubert First Symphony, in D major, similarly, got a spruce account, although I wonder if the menuetto weren't meant to go faster. One hears the 16-year-old composer's debts to Haydn, Mozart and early Beethoven, but the slow movement is already full of harmonic surprises.