White Rock City Orchestra's summer concert Friday (June 21) at St. Mark's Anglican Church, South ÐÔÊӽ紫ý — aptly subtitled Music for warm summer nights — was both a delight for the ears and a convincing flexing of the musical muscles of the group, under the able guidance of Maestra Paula DeWit.

And the standing ovation it received from the capacity crowd provided instantaneous proof of the justifiable pride the community has in the 28-member orchestra.

While admirably meeting the stated theme, the genre-spanning programme selected by DeWit â€” veering between movie music, the Baroque era and 19th- and 20th-century masterworks â€” was both ambitious and audacious.

Tackling repertoire this challenging, less than a decade ago, would have been unlikely, and perhaps inconceivable — as charming and rewarding as the White Rock Community Orchestra used to be, on many levels.

Rebranded some years ago as musical ambassadors of White Rock — and appropriately introduced and narrated at the concert by city councillor Ernie Klassen – the bar for the orchestra has been set high.

And it appears to be inching upwards each season, thanks to the leadership of DeWit, president Eric Heine, past president Peter Koyander and an influx of local musicians at, or approaching, the professional level of violinist and concert master Monika Niedzielko.

From John Williams' moving Schindler's List theme to the encore, a suitably bravura rendition of Khachaturian's Sabre Dance from his 1942 ballet Guyane, the orchestra exemplified the characteristics of a fine ensemble: a cohesion and balance between all the sections and elements, indicative of those other key necessities for a musician — aside from individual technical virtuosity — a good pair of ears and a sense of teamwork.

The concert offered a strong showing throughout, in which any hints of the bugbears of any large student or community orchestra — ensemble muddiness, tonal stridency or rhythmic disconnectedness — were very few and far between.

Niedlzelko was showcased in the previously mentioned Schindler's List, which demonstrated her exquisite intonation and emotional musicality, as well as the felicitous support of the ensemble, and in pianist and orchestra member Bruce Petherick's arrangement of Debussy's Clair de lune.

The latter, though promising, was perhaps not as successful as some of the other pieces. Although Niedzielko soloed beautifully, there was a sense that the complex voicings Petherick has provided for the ensemble strings had not quite jelled for this specific performance. Which is a shame, because Petherick's version is a fine and sensitive reimagining of an enduringly beautiful piano work, and I hope the orchestra perseveres with it and includes it in another program.

In other selections, the expressive, yet delicate duet of flautists Karen Wen and Clara Shi, well-supported by the dynamics of the strings, made for an excellent reading of 19th-century flautist Franz Doppler's Andante et Rondo â€” a delightful exploration of the timbres of sound inherent in the piece.    

Ennio Morricone's celebrated Gabriel's Oboe, from the film The Mission, provided a showcase for two strong oboe soloists in the ensemble; with Sue McFadden's sensitive, surely intoned sound nicely contrasted with the forthright expressiveness of Ted Harrison.    

Another Morricone composition, the main theme from Cinema Paradiso, arranged by Roy Tan, shone the spotlight again on strings and piano, with the lower-pitched violin of Juli Vaughn admirably interwoven with the other strings in both sweeping crescendi, and other quieter moments, when her full solo tone was nicely enhanced by well-achieved ensemble textures.

One of the highlights of the concert, for me, was DeWit's own arrangement of Astor Piazzola's Libertango â€” a terrific exercise in orchestral dynamics, by and large well-handled by the ensemble.

The piece successfully captured the passionate quality of the nuevo tango , as successive orchestral timbres, from strings to woodwinds to brass, each brought a different dramatic light to the theme, over insistent rhythms of piano, bass and percussion — a progression that was both organic and consistently exciting. This is another piece I would welcome seeing reprised in a subsequent programme. 

The Concerto for Two Oboes in C Major by Tomaso Albinoni, brought back McFadden and Harrison in highly effective interplay with a suitably Baroque-proportioned subset of the full orchestra; a splendidly idiomatic performance that served as another impressive reminder of the increasing versatility of the organization.

A further reminder of the ensemble's capabilities in multiple idioms was found in its rendition of Edward Elgar's emotionally-charged Nimrod (from his Enigma Variations), which while in different, late 19th century territory, showed the same sure touch in exploring the composer's fascinating â€” and subtly evolving — harmonic textures and shadings.

Polovtsian Dances, from Borodin's Prince Igor was another bravura display of sureness, whether in handling the delicate subtleties of the orchestration of the romantic theme (later granted pop currency as Stranger in Paradise, from the 1954 Broadway musical Kismet) or in the ensemble's ability to take in stride the intensity and intricacy of the other — far more strenuous — dance sections.