ON THE TOWN:

I owe an apology to Carl St. Clair, the musical director of the Pacific Symphony Orchestra.

A few weeks ago, my wife was listening to radio station KMZT (105.1-FM) and won some tickets to a classical music concert. So last Saturday, our family trekked up to the Los Angeles Arboretum in Arcadia (why the Los Angeles Arboretum isn’t in Los Angeles is another story) to see the California Philharmonic perform some movie music.

It didn’t really matter to me whether it was movie music or the theme to “It’s a Small World,” I am a sucker for watching an orchestra play outdoors at night.

That attraction dates to the 1960s when my mother used to drag my brother and me to Grant Park in Chicago to listen to the Chicago Symphony Orchestra.

Stuart and I watched as the orchestra tuned. Then the conductor walked out to applause dressed in a tuxedo. He stood at attention at the podium, raised his baton, paused and began conducting. That was the cue for Stuart and me to go play.

A couple of hours later, the conductor finished all of the music, took a couple of bows and left. The applause was the cue for Stuart and me to go find mom.

Over the years, I have attended hundreds of similar concerts, many of them outdoors. I did not realize it at the time, but my mother had faith that just by being in the environment, we’d pick up an appreciation for the music and the experience.

She was right. So all you parents who are suffering through the complaints of kids who are taking music lessons or dragging them kicking and screaming to museums or concerts, stay the course. Your kids will appreciate it years from now.

The arboretum concert was different than the concerts I’ve seen over the years, taking to a new low a development that concerns me. You see, I don’t like it when the conductor speaks to the audience. Bugs me to no end.

Often, the speech is a repeat of what is in the program notes, other times it is just a promotion for an upcoming show or a subtle pitch to support the enterprise with our dollars.

Doesn’t matter, I don’t like it, and I doubt that I ever will. Solti didn’t do it, Mehta didn’t do it, and neither did any of the other great conductors I have seen over the years.

St. Clair speaks to the audience on a regular basis. So does Los Angeles Philharmonic conductor John Mauceri.

But I doubt that any of the speaking conductors I have ever seen will ever be as annoying as the fellow who led the California Philharmonic that night.

Not only did he talk way too much, he got a few things wrong. When, for example, he was introducing the music from the film “Pirates of the Caribbean,” he tried to get the audience to sing along to “Yo, ho, yo, ho, a pirate’s life for me!” But instead, he mixed up two Disney films and asked us to join him in, “Hi, ho, hi, ho, a pirate’s life for me!”

There was more, and I won’t bore you with the details, but suffice it to say that it was way beyond what passes these days for the usual and customary conductor address.

Here’s where the apology comes in. As much as I dislike St. Clair’s speechifying, I see now that at least he does it with some style and does not ramble. If this conductor interaction is a trend, I am grateful at least to have St. Clair talking to us and not someone like the arboretum guy.

The evening was not a total loss.

Before the show, we stopped by the KMZT booth and saw our family friend, Gary Hollis, who hosts the 10 a.m. to 3 p.m. slot on the station each weekday.

Cay and I met Hollis after she won a trip to Alaska in 2001. (By the way, as you can see, it pays to listen to classical music). Hollis and his friend, Bill Maxwell, Cay and I were instant friends. These days, I have Hollis on the radio days as the music helps me concentrate, but I also like his voice. And Maxwell keeps us supplied with the world’s best hot sauce, which he makes from scratch.

Hollis as a classical DJ is to me what Vin Scully is as a baseball announcer: Listening to either one is like taking a walk in the park.

Hollis happens to be one of those genuinely nice people you meet every so often in life, and it was just by chance that the four of us missed a chance at a run-in with fate.

That’s because we returned from Alaska on Sept. 10, 2001, one day before the planes crashed into the World Trade Center. Had we left a day later, we would have been stuck together in the middle of nowhere.

Maybe that would not have been so bad, as it would have given me a chance to ask an expert what he thinks about conductors speaking to their audiences.