UTAH SYMPHONY, Abravanel Hall, Dec. 5; additional performance 8 p.m. Dec. 6, tickets at 801-355-2787, 888-451-2787 or www.utahsymphony.org 

Beethoven’s Ninth Symphony is a staple in the Utah Symphony’s repertoire. It’s played here fairly frequently, and along with the Fifth, it’s also among his most popular and best known works.

The Ninth is again on the program this weekend. Beethoven’s music does do wonders with concert attendance in Salt Lake City, and programming it this weekend was a good marketing decision, since the Masterworks concerts in early December traditionally don’t attract a big audience. Thanks to Beethoven, Friday’s performance was sold out.

Thierry Fischer, who conducts this weekend, tends to be adventurous in his Beethoven interpretations, and his Ninth is no exception. He went for dramatic impact and a big sound. He got all that, but at the expense of clarity and clean articulation. That was most noticeable in the first two movements. Fischer likes fast tempos, and these two movements were taken at a sprightly pace that didn’t always serve the music well. There were many instances in which the subtle interplay among instrumental sections was lost; the resulting sound was, therefore, rather jumbled.

Nor did it help that Fischer’s baton flew out of his hand towards the end of the Scherzo. It  broke the momentum that he had been building to this point. Fischer kept on conducting and he and the orchestra finished the movement without further incident. Associate principal viola Roberta Zalkind, at whose feet the baton landed, handed it back to Fischer at the end of the movement.

The most successful movement was the Adagio. One of Beethoven’s most reflective slow movements, Fischer’s treatment underscored the exquisite lyricism of the music. The orchestra played magnificently, especially the strings, and principal clarinet Tad Calcara did a magnificent job with his solos.

The Utah Symphony Chorus was wonderful, as it always is, as were the soloists: soprano Celena Shafer; mezzo-soprano Cynthia Hanna; tenor Chad Shelton; and bass-baritone Michael Dean.

Also on the program is Henri Dutilleux’s 5 Métaboles, written in 1964 for George Szell and the Cleveland Orchestra.

The five-movement work is fabulously crafted. Dutilleux is a meticulous composer; there is a lot of detail in his music, but this doesn’t distract from the broader picture he paints. And thanks to his keen talent for orchestrating (a common trait among French composers), his music is virtuosic, vibrant and dynamic.

Fischer showed a solid grasp of the score and conveyed his thoughts succinctly to the orchestra. They, in turn, played with crisp articulation, clean execution and beautifully expressed lyricism.