vip in the city

Sexy strings

At Central Park’s Naumburg Bandshell tonight for the third program in the 2007 Naumburg Orchestral Concert Series: Antonio Vivaldi’s Four Seasons and Astor Piazzolla’s Cuatro Estaciones Porteñas (The Four Seasons of Buenos Aires) performed by the Brooklyn Philharmonic under the direction of conductor Alexander Platt.

There was a pre-concert talk by Dr. James Lentini, as part of “Miami University Night with Naumburg,” during which Lentini offered some background on the jazz and Argentinian tango influences of Piazzolla, whose homage to Vivaldi’s most famous work almost begs for side-by-side performance. (He did not, however, adequately explain to host Elliott Forrest of WQXR, just why Miami University is in Ohio.)

Tonight’s soloist Lara St. John is a 6-foot tall, blonde, “Junoesque” performer known as much for her bodaciousness as for her bowing skills. (See also: Vanessa Mae and the original violin vixen, Anne-Sophie Mutter.)

St. John arrived on the scene a decade ago, raising eyebrows with her debut album cover in which the “classical babe” posed topless with a strategically placed violin.

It was the music, though, and not the eye candy that entranced the crowd lining The Mall this night.