Summer orchestra programs seem generally be selected using one criterion: Will the program survive the beer and blanket test? As in, will the music stand up to the distractions of the summer season at the Mann, where themed picnics and fireworks tend to leave a longer-lasting impression than the music itself?

    Under the direction of Grant Llewellyn on Tuesday night, the Philadelphia Orchestra opened a two-week run of the expected popular favorites and crowd-pleasers, while also plugging the lesser-known work of Erich Wolfgang Korngold, a shining star in a program that luxuriated in easy-listening favorites.

    Easing into the program with Strauss' “On the Beautiful Blue Danube,” Llewellyn cruised at a relaxed pace that pleasantly contrasted the oom-pah-pahing that too often characterizes this piece. The languid tempo, though the perfect accompaniment for picnics and summer crowds, took its toll close to the end, however, as the final few bars came to their rather abrupt crescendo, taking the low strings seemingly by surprise at the work's close.

    Soloist Lara St. John resumed control with her elastic, yet nimble interpretation of Korngold's Violin Concerto in D Major. Korngold (1897 - 1957), then a emerging film score composer, was hurt by the critical assumption that film scores were not to be taken seriously, and battled to maintain elements of a classical composition in the concerto. Under St. John's bow, the piece sparkled with arpeggios that belied the narrative arc of a film score during the Moderato nobile. The soloist's bow action proved especially adept during a series of chord progressions backed by pizzacato strings, rapidly changing from metronomic chords into a shimmering conclusion to the first movement. Moving through the more classical second movement with clear, pitch-perfect upper register work, St. John moved adeptly into a Copland-esque conclusion, playing up the folksy undertones of the work and bringing out the playful progressions and tonalities.

     Played in its full-orchestra glory, rather than as an organ solo, Tocatta and Fugue in D minor here served to highlight the quick tempos and off-beat rhythms necessary to create the musical drama of the work, providing a refreshing rhythmic tension that served as a nice introduction to the reliable, yet enjoyable Star Wars Suite for Orchestra, by popular film composer John Williams.

     And while kicking back and humming along to the familiar chords of "Emperor's March" and the "Imperial March," I had to admit that maybe the more relaxed summer program schedule wasn't really so bad after all, as it provides the appropriate levity to launch into the full-speed-ahead programming Dutoit has in store for this fall.