By Lyn Bronson

The Mozart Society of California has found a new temporary home for its concerts. The concert given by the Stanford Woodwind Quintet on Friday, January 30, was the first the Mozart Society has presented at the Mayflower Presbyterian Church in Pacific Grove. Acoustically it was a great success, and a capacity audience filled both the church pews and the overflow seats lining the back walls. The question remains how many more concerts can be held in this venue before growing membership forces the Society to search for a larger location. Ultimately, I believe, Sunset Center in Carmel will be the final venue. Sunset Center will soon become the storage facility for a new Hamburg Steinway concert grand recently purchased by the Carmel Music Society. For the Mozart Society to move to Sunset Center for all of its concerts would solve the other major problem-providing a first-class piano for its events.

So, the recent concert at the Mayflower was acoustically a success. How about its musical values? Well, that depends on your expectations. If you were expecting a pleasant evening of what the German-speaking world lovingly calls “Hausmusik,” meaning a group of excellent musicians coming together to read through some stimulating music, then your expectations would have been exceeded. The Stanford Woodwind Quintet consists of flutist Alexandra Hawley (no relation, we assume, to Mozart Society Board member Thomas Hart Hawley), oboist James Matheson, clarinetist Sheryl Renk, horn player Lawrence Ragent and bassoonist Rufus Olivier. Pianist Paul Hersh, a faculty member of the San Francisco Conservatory, joined the quintet for three out of four of the program selections. These are all excellent musicians, and each is master of his or her craft.

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