MUSIC REVIEW : Ju Hee Suh Beats Adversity at Bowl

File this one under “triumph over adversity.” Even before the concert began Thursday at Hollywood Bowl, things were not going as planned. The soloist, Mikhail Pletniev, discovered a scheduling conflict and had to be replaced by a 23-year-old debutant.

Then the Cahuenga Pass seemed to become the site of “Flight of the Intruder II,” with several mood-shattering sorties from light aircraft. The 11,527 fans who showed up included an unusually large contingent of bottle-bouncers, and the vaunted sound system took the occasion to obliterate the delicate end of the first movement of the “Symphonie fantastique” with static crackle.

All of this, of course, is simply life at the Bowl--just more so than usual. What made the vicissitudes particularly galling was that at the same time some highly spirited and sophisticated music-making was struggling to be heard.

In her local and Los Angeles Philharmonic debut, Ju Hee Suh brought much personality, as well as quick, strong fingers and considerable intelligence, to bear on Beethoven’s “Emperor” Concerto. The Curtis-trained Korean pianist conveyed real joy, in both serene and athletic modes, in the assignment.

She also displayed an astonishing range of color and articulation. Though no model of stylistic purity, she served the spirit of the Beethovenian law with pertinent fidelity and uncommon liveliness.

John Nelson led a generally alert and flexible accompaniment, exuberant in its own right.

Nelson then proved he earned his reputation as a Berlioz interpreter of persuasive acuity with a “Symphonie fantastique” thoroughly fantastic in all the connotations of the word. This one took off from coherently paced and projected musical values, letting the programmatic psychodrama emerge for the listeners rather than drive the performers.

The Philharmonic gave him explosively accented playing without rhetorical exaggeration. The sound shifted easily from the early elegance to the chill manias of the end while preserving the clarity and immediacy of a grand-scale chamber music.

The concert began with Beethoven’s “Creatures of Prometheus” Overture, slack and slovenly played in its introduction, then grasping with evident relief the tide of its allegro energies.