The Australian Chamber Orchestra at Auckland Town Hall

By WILLIAM DART

Not even Beethoven on the programme - usually a sure-fire guarantee of an audience - could get the Australian Chamber Orchestra more than a middling attendance on Wednesday night.

This was intensely disappointing as we don't often have the chance to experience the musical finesse this group offers.

For those who did go along, a lollipop starter was the reward - the Nocturne from Borodin's D major Quartet.

It may have been a rather docile opener but its lushness was more than compensation, especially when the violas were in the spotlight.

Ravel's Quartet, beefed up for a string orchestra, was a startler.

The tremolo outbursts in the last movement almost threw one back in one's seat; the climaxes shattered.

Richard Tognetti's skill as an arranger showed in the careful textures, setting off with just a few instruments and letting the full contingent steal gently in.

Miraculously, the transparency of Ravel's original was never threatened.

After interval came Beethoven's Kreutzer Sonata, arranged as a Concerto for Violin and String Orchestra.

Tognetti had taken his lead from the composer's own title page which describes it as Sonata for pianoforte and obbligato violin, written in a very concerted style, almost like that of a Concerto.

The problem, alas, is that the solo violin often has trouble asserting itself against a body of strings.

In the original, the roles of piano and violin are more sharply delineated.

Certainly the orchestral richness was awe-inspiring, whether in the opening exchanges of the first movement or the graceful theme of the Andante con Variazioni, where Tognetti called on darker colours.

This slow movement had patches when everyone, Beethoven included, seemed to be treading water.

However, all was forgiven when the key turned to F minor and the music became more emotionally searching, and then slipped back to the major for a charming Haydnesque serenade.

There were eccentricities - an arpeggiated sweep on the piano does not necessarily an effective cello solo make - but the Australians certainly didn't hold back when it came to energy.

The first movement had a gypsy fire that isn't quite so apparent in the original while the Finale seemed more tarantella than ever.