"I don't think a Chamber Music Hawaii audience has ever heard a concert with two living composers," cellist Karen Bechtel pointed out during her introductions.

CMH's Galliard String Quartet opened its concert season Monday with works by Tan Dun, who catapulted to fame when he won an Academy Award for his musical score to the film "Crouching Tiger, Hidden Dragon," and Eric Ewazen, whose works have won awards and have been performed and recorded around the world.

The two works could not have been more different.

Tan's "Eight Colors," composed in the 1980s, is one of those "sound effects" pieces that uses unconventional techniques to "paint" an extra-musical idea, such as "Shadows" or "Cloudiness." Tan's inspiration was the Peking Opera, where he earned his living before becoming a composer.

Part of the aesthetic behind such pieces is to explore and expand the possibilities of sound and of what instruments can produce. Bechtel joked beforehand, "Even though it won't be pretty, it can't be more than 15 minutes long."

The sounds may have been unusual — enough so that it was not entirely clear whether the squeaky chair was intentional — but several movements were vividly descriptive, especially "Zen," "Drum and Gong" and "Black Dance."

Tan is now writing in a different style, but it is interesting to listen to where he was, compositionally, 20 years ago.

Ewazen's "Valleys," commissioned just last year for CMH's 25th anniversary, is unabashedly tonal, warmly expressive and free-flowing. Built through varied repetition, the music "paints" Hawai'i's steep valleys, the cello line rising from its lowest notes up to first violin part, floating high and light above it all.

Quite beautiful — one can only hope it will be recorded.

"Valleys" is one movement of the commission. The complete work is titled "Islands of Dreams and Drama," and the remaining movements will be performed over the course of the year — as individual "island" movements tying the season together.

The rest of the program came from standard repertoire: Borodin's String Quartet No. 2 in D Major and Mendelssohn's Opus 44 String Quartet.

Borodin's Quartet features the cello in almost every movement and remains popular in part because its themes became part of the Broadway musical "Kismet." (Remember "Baubles, Bangles and Beads"? "And This is My Beloved"?)

The quartet closed with a sparkling performance of Mendelssohn's Quartet.

ENSEMBLES OFFER WEALTH OF SELECTIONS

The Galliard Quartet is one of four Chamber Music Hawaii groups: the others are the Spring Wind Quintet, the Honolulu Brass Quintet, and Tresemble, a larger, mixed group that pulls musicians from the other three groups.

One of the most delightful aspects of CMH seasons is the groups' choice of music. They include standard masterworks, but they also program interesting and engaging lesser-known music. Thus, among the Mendelssohns, Brahmses, Dvoraks and Haydns are transcriptions of older works by Victoria and Praetorius, as well as more recent works by Higden, Still, Karg-Elert, Haas, Kilar, Zappa, Lovelock and Howarth.

Each group usually performs two concerts per season, with each concert performed twice, once at Paliku on the Windward side, and once at the Doris Duke Theatre in Honolulu.

This year, CMH has added extra, one-time-only performances.

In December, the Honolulu Brass Choir and organist John Renke will present holiday favorites at St. Andrew's Cathedral.

And in February, Tresemble, conducted by Anne Krinitsky, will join forces with the Onium Ballet Project to offer two ballets from the 1920s: Hindemith's "The Demon," a dark tale of a demon taunting two sisters; and Martinu's whimsical "Kitchen Review, or Temptation of the Saintly Pot," a melodrama about the marriage of Pot and Lid.

CMH will also participate in a commemorative concert, titled "How to Make a Difference: A Tribute to Nancy Bannick." The concert will take place at Blaisdell Concert Hall in November.