Orchestra’s Playing Is Just a Little Too Spirited

It was the kind of bawdy behavior normally associated with rock ‘n’ roll bands: allegations of rowdy musicians drinking in public, throwing things around and refusing to keep the noise down.

But the band that got kicked off an Amsterdam-to-Los Angeles flight was neither a thrash-and-burn heavy metal group nor a raucous rap band.

It was the St. Petersburg Philharmonic, Russia’s oldest symphony orchestra.

About 90 of the orchestra’s members were removed from the aircraft Monday during a scheduled layover at Washington’s Dulles International Airport, United Airlines officials said. The orchestra was on its way to Los Angeles for a scheduled concert tonight at the Dorothy Chandler Pavilion, launching a monthlong American tour, officials said.

Despite the unexpected stopover, tonight’s show will go on, according to a spokeswoman for the Los Angeles Philharmonic.

St. Petersburg orchestra members, who continued to Los Angeles on a later flight, were still traveling Tuesday and could not be reached for comment.

Their scheduled program tonight will include the works of Prokofiev, Stravinsky and Shostakovich.

But that performance may not be nearly as memorable as the one that United flight crew members and passengers said the orchestra gave during the Amsterdam-to-Dulles leg of their trip.

While on Flight 947, United officials said, many members of the group drank liquor from bottles they had brought on board, talked loudly and disturbed other passengers, and refused to sit or follow the crew’s safety commands.

The cacophony prompted United officials to bring down the curtain on the orchestra’s second act. The musicians were removed from the plane, and the flight continued to Los Angeles without them.

Members spent the night in the Washington area at their own expense. It was not clear whether Yuri Temirkanov, the Philharmonic’s conductor, was among them.

Booked on another United flight Tuesday, the orchestra members apparently had learned the limits of creative expression in the strict world of airline travel.

They showed up in “much different spirits,” said Susana Leyva, a spokeswoman for United.

She said the group met with an airline representative before boarding.

“We outlined a conduct agreement that, while in flight, our crew is in charge,” she said. “Our representative was very confident that they would observe all safety rules on board the flight today.”

Citing airline policy, Leyva would not say which flight the musicians were on or what time they were due to arrive.

She said United did not pay for their unexpected stay in Washington because, like all other carriers, the airline only puts up passengers overnight as a result of a mechanical or weather delay.

For many years known as the Leningrad Philharmonic, the St. Petersburg group is the oldest symphony orchestra in Russia, dating to 1882, when it performed for the aristocracy.

It frequently makes trips to Europe and was last in the United States in 1998.

Elizabeth Hinckley, a spokeswoman for the Los Angeles Philharmonic, confirmed that the group would perform as scheduled tonight at 8.

She did not, as of yet, have a contact for comment from the group.

Like United, she seemed ready to forgive and forget whatever behavior may have prompted the delay.

“They’re on their way,” Hinckley said Tuesday afternoon. “So everything is fine.”