In the 1970s and '80s, some of the Soviet Union's best musicians emigrated. Now many of those who left are returning for occasional concert appearances, and a very few have come back as virtually full-time participants in the musical life of Russia.


Among the latter is conductor Misha Rakhlevsky, 48, the founder and music director of a young ensemble known as Chamber Orchestra Kremlin.


Trained in Moscow as a violinist, Rakhlevsky left the Soviet Union in 1973. Three years later, he accepted an offer to join the Detroit Symphony and in the mid-1980s went on to create and lead a highly successful group known as the New American Chamber Orchestra. Later, he established a full-scale symphony orchestra in Granada, Spain.


During the momentous Moscow summer of 1991, Rakhlevsky returned to his native city and gathered a small ad hoc group of musicians to tape a pair of recordings for the Swiss label Claves. Intrigued by the excitement and variety of Moscow's musical life and by the high level of the talent he found here, Rakhlevsky resolved to make this his principal base of operations and to turn his recording group into a permanent chamber ensemble.


In the course of its relatively brief existence, Chamber Orchestra Kremlin has become a very important part of the Moscow musical scene. Eleven tours have taken the orchestra to Spain, Portugal, France, Switzerland, the British Isles and South Korea, while its 11 compact discs to date for Claves have received unusually high acclaim from critics on both sides of the Atlantic.


On Monday evening, Chamber Orchestra Kremlin plays a program of Grieg, Schumann and Schnittke in the columned hall of the Pushkin Museum. Just three days later, the ensemble will find itself in Worcester, Massachusetts, for the opening concert of an inaugural tour of the United States. Twenty more concerts through the beginning of March will take the orchestra to New York City and down the East Coast of the United States to Florida.


Last Thursday, in the Small Hall of the Moscow Conservatory, Chamber Orchestra Kremlin gave a preview of the sort of playing and of a part of the repertoire which American audiences will hear over the coming weeks. Rakhlevsky was clearly in command that evening, and his 16 string players, averaging 26 years in age, responded with some superbly played and thoroughly committed performances of Shostakovich, Janacek, Rossini and Schoenberg. At times, and particularly in the closing pages of Schoenberg's familiar "Transfigured Night," Rakhlevsky and his orchestra came astonishingly close to this listener's idea of musical perfection.


Off the podium, Rakhlevsky exudes enormous enthusiasm for his orchestra and for the tasks he has set out for himself. The conductor's musical inclinations run mainly to the 19th and 20th centuries. "This is where I have something to say," he remarked. "In order to play a composition, I need an inner conviction and a belief in my own interpretation. With the baroque, in particular, I just don't have the same feeling as I do for the romantic."


As a result, the orchestra's repertoire holds little of the Bach, Vivaldi or Mozart which are the staples of most small orchestral ensembles. At the other end of the musical spectrum, however, Rakhlevsky has found considerable room for the works of contemporary composers. The orchestra has already presented a number of world premieres and last October took an important part in the Moscow festival honoring composer Alfred Schnittke.


The future plans of Chamber Orchestra Kremlin include more local concerts, more tours and more recordings. With a level of direction and playing as high as that of any musical group in Moscow, its future, both at home and abroad, promises to be very bright indeed.





Tickets may be ordered for Chamber Orchestra Kremlin's 7 P.M. Monday concert at the Pushkin Museum by telephoning 122-4171 between the hours of 1 and 6 P.M.