The concert in question left me bewildered. How could a collection of 12- to 18-year-olds play and sound better than my college orchestra at the highly regarded School of Music at Northwestern University in the late 1940s, some of whose members went directly into major symphony orchestras?

Of course, with their tender years the orchestra members have experienced only a limited number of orchestral works. But as to what they know and play, they do so superbly. Since that first concert, only two other orchestra concerts in the Bay Area brought me to the verge of tears at the surpassing beauty of its sound, and both were the California Youth Symphony.

I attended the current youth symphony's concert Sunday at the San Mateo Performing Arts Center, to test whether my recollections were correct. They were.

The orchestra still rests on a plane of its own.

This is not the very best orchestra the organization has assembled, but it is the most balanced. Some wind instrumentalists have not fully matured musically, but there is a french horn section that some conductors would envy.

While the strings have always soared in performances, now the entire brass section is the best in my memory.

The orchestra still holds the prize for the beauty of its sound, precision of execution and mastery of dynamic sweeps from the softest to the loudest and back. After mulling the phenomenon of this orchestra for a number of years, I believe I have the answer.

It is the result of a confluence of forces. For one, reductions in the funding of high school arts programs after Prop. 13 nudged many of the very best prospects, who previously were shared among the schools, to these privately operated youth orchestras.

Then, as the Bay Area is blessed with numerous first-rate private music teachers and many residents have the ability to enroll their children, they start them very early.

Some organizations offer scholarships, as well.

Perhaps most important is the engagement of first-class professional music directors -- in this case, for the past 14 years, Leo Eylar, violinist, conductor and composer. And he has not catered to their youth but has presented programs that could make many regional orchestra musicians pale.

Who would have even thought of programs so complex, booming and bewildering as Gustav Mahler's "Symphony No. 1 in D Major" for teenagers in my day? And then to have it turn to perfection?

"La Valse" by Maurice Ravel is also a test for a mature and somewhat Romantic performance.

And how often would one hear a remarkably mature performance of Samuel Barber's "Concerto for Violin and Orchestra, Op 14," by a 16-year-old? Jessica Ling not only has a ravishing violin tone, but in the last finger-busting movement, she and the entire upper string section soared.

And she is only one of an astonishing number of teenage soloists who are appearing with Bay Area orchestras these days.

I guess my memory did serve me well.

Keith Kreitman is a freelance writer. You can reach him by calling (650) 348-4327 or by e-mail at Rainykeith@aol.com.

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