Bodin began, for example, by using the same textures that open Schubert's slow movement: very soft, sustained string sounds, punctuated by bits of pizzicato accompaniment, pizzicatos as soft as droplets in a light spring rain. Even his eventual dramatic passages carried a sense of demure elegance. There was no hint of Mahlerian self-pity of the "Please feel my pain" variety, and many thanks for that.

This is clearly a composer who knows about formal clarity. One hopes to hear more from him, and soon. On today's scene, such compositions lie few and far between. I've no idea what the commission fee amounted to, but it was money well spent. This feeling was evidently shared by the audience, which gave Bodin such a rousing ovation that it would not have seemed out of order to repeat the whole work on the spot. The only thing that might be held against the piece is its overly cutesy title, a thing much at odds with what is essentially a dignified composition.

I can only assume that Moravec made great strides from his 1998 Mood Swings to his Pulitzer Prize win two years ago. Although well-played by violinist Anna Presler, cellist Tanya Tomkins, and pianist Sarah Cahill, this was a raucous piece of quasi-Romantic exaggerations. Perhaps Mood Swings was an early effort of Moravec's student days; it certainly sounded so. Even basics of organizational technique failed to show themselves. If, for instance, you are going for a big climax, it takes more than making a loud texture get even louder. The inner workings of the score, such as harmonic tensions, must be strengthened. Otherwise, it's just noise, and Moravec gave us lots of that. Why Mood Swings was programmed leaves me puzzled.

Schubert's C-Major Quintet is, of course, one of the great masterpieces of his final year — a year of many such, including the E-Flat-Major Mass, the Schwanengesang song cycle, the last three piano sonatas, the massive Ninth Symphony, and sketches for a Tenth, completion of Moments musicaux, and more. The list is remarkable in itself, but that the man was grievously ill the whole time renders such an output astonishing.

The quintet is long, terribly difficult in terms of capturing its smiling-through-tears mood, and often technically traitorous to play, particularly during the scherzo. (Schubert seems to have had it in for violinists during his closing years; witness the beautiful but nearly unmanageable Fantasy in C Major for violin and piano from 1827.) It's simply not reasonable violin writing, although, when it succeeds, it's a wonderfully effective composition. The high violin writing in the Scherzo is downright cruel, but it came off handsomely under Presler's fingers.

This performance was wonderful — not without minor slips here or there, but far above average. Tempos were flawless, with excellent voicing among the five musicians: violinists Presler and Phyllis Kamrin, violist-director Kurt Rohde, plus cellists Tomkins and Leighton Fong. Those same strings played the Bodin, with the excellent musicianship that had been in evidence throughout the Schubert as well.

When, at the concert, Bodin was asked to say a few words prior to his piece, he related an interesting but alarming little incident from his day. It turned out that he'd been assaulted that very afternoon in the Telegraph Hill area. "I'd expected that area to be safe," he told the audience, "but that's what you face when they're playing new music." People naturally chuckled, as, happily, Bodin didn't seem any the worse for what he'd been through a few hours before.