Brahms for Kids? Call Is Answered : Radio: Children’s tastes are more sophisticated than KFSD program director imagined.

Kingsley McLaren thinks that youngsters ought to have a more edifying alternative to the Saturday morning barrage of cartoons on television.

So last month, the program director of KFSD-FM, San Diego’s only classical music station, inaugurated “Kids Klassics,” a 7-9 a.m. Saturday program that plays classical requests from children.

“Their requests are more sophisticated than I thought they would be,” McLaren said. “They have asked for Grieg’s Piano Concerto, and I had one 8-year-old who asked for Shostakovich’s Cello Sonata. I was completely bowled over by that request.”

McLaren was curious to find out if the Shostakovich request was on the up and up, so he contacted the boy’s father, who assured him that his son had sent in the sophisticated request.

“He is learning the sonata, so he asked to hear it on the radio,” explained the proud parent.

McLaren stumbled on the idea for the kid’s request program three years ago when his daughter asked him to play her favorite Christmas carol over the air during the holiday season. While he was playing the carol and dedicating the piece to her, he thought that other children should have the same opportunity his daughter had.

The following Christmas, McLaren inaugurated a Saturday morning call-in program on KFSD-FM, on which youngsters could request their favorite holiday song or carol.

“We were inundated with phone calls,” he said. “The first time out we received 600 calls from kids.”

Rather than phoning the station, youngsters must write in to request music for the “Kids Klassics” program. McLaren explained that this method allowed him to dedicate a single piece to several young listeners who had requested the same title. Among the most frequently requested selections were Tchaikovsky’s ballet “The Nutcracker,” the tone poems of Aaron Copland, and miniatures such as Reinhold Gliere’s “The Red Poppy.”

In addition to playing requests, McLaren airs biographies of great classical composers that have been tailored for young audiences.

“Over the first five weeks I have been playing a CD titled ‘Mr. Beethoven Lives Upstairs,’ which is made by a Canadian outfit called the Children’s Group. After we get through Beethoven, I’ll move on to Vivaldi and Bach.”

KFSD-FM has not yet snagged sponsors for this unique endeavor, but McLaren stated that the station was negotiating with several bidders.

Brahms on disc. Native son Frank Almond has just released a splendid recording of all three Brahms Violin Sonatas on the Sonoris label.

His collaborator on the project is William Wolfram, a pianist with whom he has frequently performed and who made a solid impression as soloist with the San Diego Symphony last summer.

Their Brahms performances on the Sonoris compact disc display a full-blooded Romantic temperament perfectly matched with the taut classical discipline that undergirds the sonatas. To say that there is ample chemistry between the two musicians is an understatement, yet their enthusiasm for these richly melodic, contrapuntal gems never pushes them beyond the pale.

Almond’s sonority comes across unusually rich in the recording, taut and even throughout the range. Notable is his propulsive drive in the dark D Minor Sonata, Op. 108, complemented by Wolfram’s firm, even touch.

This fall, Almond joined the Ft. Worth Symphony as interim concertmaster. Before accepting this post, Almond had free-lanced in New York for several years, commuting to San Diego for several months each season to teach and perform at San Diego State University.

In Ft. Worth, Almond is filling in for concertmaster Robert Davidovici, who is on a one-year sabbatical. Almond’s stint will carry him through Ft. Worth’s 1993 Van Cliburn Piano Competition, in which the Ft. Worth Symphony and Chamber Orchestra perform with the finalists.

Symphony Schedule Changes. After trimming three weeks from this year’s season as a cost-cutting measure, the San Diego Symphony has eliminated the young people’s concert scheduled for Wednesday and Thursday and the family concert on Nov. 22. Friday’s Nickelodeon Concert “Aelita: Queen of Mars”--the first Soviet science fiction film, with Dennis James playing the theremin--has been rescheduled for April 2. The Nov. 21 concert of Hispanic music has been rescheduled for April 3.

CRITIC’S CHOICE

FELIX FAN RECITAL

Felix Fan, La Jolla’s 17-year-old cello prodigy, will play a joint recital with organist Robert Plimpton Sunday at 7:30 p.m. at the First Presbyterian Church of San Diego.

A student of Indiana University’s Janos Starker and Yale’s Aldo Parisot, Fan displays both control of his instrument and insight into the literature.

Accompanied by Plimpton, Fan will play Beethoven’s Sonata in C, Op. 102, No. 1 and Max Bruch’s Kol Nidre. Plimpton, resident organist of the Presbyterian Church and San Diego Civic Organist, will play Brahms’ Prelude and Fugue in G Minor, two Chorale Preludes by J. S. Bach, and Leo Sowerby’s tone poem “Comes Autumn Time.”