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GREENSBORO - As Elmar Oliveira tore into the home stretch of the first movement of Tchaikovsky's Violin Concerto on Saturday at the Eastern Music Festival, he broke into a satisfied grin, as if he knew had embarked on a rare performance.

Loose hairs on his bow had been plaguing him. But major trouble was averted, and the opening of his bravura performance came to an electrifying finish.

Under the skillful baton of guest conductor Jorge Mester, Oliveira continued with a particularly piquant reading of the wistful canzonetta and then executed an emotional 180 in the passionate, full-throttled finale.

This concerto has been played at many EMF festivals, but never better. Oliveira brought the concerto everything it needed - stamina, technical flash, enormous warmth and heart-on-your-sleeve romanticism.

Just as Midori's inwardly focused playing perfectly suited Brahms' violin concerto at EMF three weeks ago, Oliveira's expansiveness perfectly suited Tchaikovsky's.

The orchestra, under guest conductor Jorge Mester, displayed an ensemble and clarity unheard earlier this season. The woodwinds, also prominent in the second movement of the Brahms, were even better Saturday. Sonorous clarinet and flute work in the canzonetta superbly set off Oliveria's violin.

This concerto has been Oliveira's bread and butter since he took the Gold Metal at the Tchaikovsky International Competition in Moscow 30 years ago. He's played it hundreds of times. The EMF concert preceded more performances of it next month in China, Japan and Taiwan.

Certainly, Oliveria has changed physically. At 58, he looked more like Mr. Clean than the matinee idol on his early album covers. But his musicianship showed no sign of age or hint of staleness. He had every reason to be pleased, and judging from the bravos, hugs from Mester and foot-stomping in the orchestra, everyone else was ecstatic, too.

The program finale was Mussorgsky's "Pictures at an Exhibition." The starter was Bernstein's "Divertimento for Orchestra," a tray of seven musical canapes that were pure musical ham on wry.

Composed for piano, "Pictures" was little known until Ravel orchestrated it in 1921, creating a showpiece for orchestra and soloists that has been a staple of the repertoire since. Sadly, though, overexposure has dulled its pallette.

Mester and the orchestra threw fresh paint on the old canvas in a major musical restoration.

Of all the live accounts I've heard of "Pictures" in 50 years, this was by far the best and rivaled some of cherished recordings, including Reiner's with the Chicago Symphony. The playing had precision, uncanny immediacy and a transparency that brought out details I'd never heard before.

Highlights included Steve Spusek's haunted alto sax solo throughout "The Old Castle" and the way Spusek and Mester stretched the final note in a perfect fade out.

Quite special, too, were Lee Hipp and Demondrae Thurman's lumbering tubas in "Bydlo," the trumpet and brass choirs in the "Promenade" and "Catacombs" sections, the bustle of the strings in the "Marketplace at Limoges" and thumping percussion in "Baba-Yaga."

The 1980 Divertimento, commissioned for the centennial of the Boston Symphony, was one of the Bernstein's final works. In his last years, he grew notorious for these insubstantial pieces for special occasions.

This one was stuffed with allusions to his own works and major Boston Symphony commissions, like Bartok's Concerto for Orchestra. Tossed in were some bluesy burlesque-house bumps and grinds. The orchestra made it livelier than the music really was.

Jim Shertzer is a freelance contributor.