★★★☆☆ 1/2 An odd idea that's mainly a miss, with smooth conducting from Tilson Thomas

Masterpieces in Miniature

It's an interesting idea for a major conductor and orchestra to release a disc of random short pieces. The program is reminiscent of the budget Classical sampler discs that float around in space. But perhaps Michael Tilson Thomas and his San Francisco Symphony wanted to reach out to the lucky dippers while still appealing to serious listeners. At least we don't have any of the horrific condensed movements from symphonies or any other such nightmares. There is a rather cheesy arrangement of Debussy's La plus que lente, though.

As it is, we start off with the best selection of all. Litolff's Schezo from the Concerto Symphonique No. 4 is a dazzling, scampering piece. And it's hard to imagine anyone outdoing Yuja Wang, who plays with her distinctive control and playfulness. But heading deeper in the program, everything soon starts to suffer from sameness. Hearing classic short works like Faure's Pavane, Rachmaninov's Vocalise, and Sibelius's Valse Triste one after the other isn't my preferred format for listening. But the main problem is that Tilson Thomas runs through most of them rather glibly, without much feeling. One can't fault the playing of the orchestra or the sound, but how many of us want to spend an hour listening to smooth readings of these pieces? As we move through multiple musical idioms, character seems homogenized. Delius should sound quite a bit different from Rachmaninov. After ten fairly tranquil selections, I found relief with the final track, the Cortege de Bacchus from Delibes Sylvia. At least it's upbeat.

It would take special performances of these works to make me go out of my way. For the most part, this is a complete pass, although I'll be heading over to my download site to buy the Litolff with Wang. So maybe it makes sense to give way to lucky dipping. The discarded "Blumine" movement from Mahler's "Titan" Symphony isn't bad either.