Live, Video: Find classical music concert, opera, ballet and dance reviews | English | Symphony no. 3 in D major "Polish", Op.25

Yu-An Chang and the Boston Symphony Orchestra premiere Chihchun Chi-sun Lee's commission and Till Fellner offers a lucid, elegant classical interpretation of Mozart.

Andrey Baranov's stunning performance of Shostakovich's harrowing Violin concerto no. 1 with Daniel Raiskin and the Belgrade Philharmonic overshadowed the other items in the programme.

In memorable performances, Osmo Vänskä and the Minnesota Orchestra showcased lesser-known scores as part of their Tchaikovsky Marathon.

Nicola Benedetti gives energetic rendition of Marsalis' Violin Concerto.

Although nominally a Polish Festival celebrating the music of Frédéric Chopin, there was lots of Tchaikovsky on offer at this year’s event. Leading the foreign charge was the Russian National Orchestra under the direction of their mercurial maestro Mikhail Pletnev.

One of the most difficult transitions in the orchestral world is that of concertmaster, or leader, to concerto soloist. In last night’s concert, San Diego Symphony concertmaster Jeff Thayer proved himself up to that task, in one of the violin repertoire’s most demanding works Béla Bartók’s Violin Concerto no. 2.

Wednesday night’s Prom saw the Bournemouth Symphony Orchestra and their principal conductor Kirill Karabits give the fourth instalment of the season’s Tchaikovsky symphony cycle with the sunny, confident Third, in D major. As the programme noted, the D major symphony is somewhat hard to place between the folksy, popular appeal of the first two and the high psychological drama of nos. 4–6.

Tchaikovsky’s early symphonies are getting a fair bit of exposure at present, both in the concert hall and on disc, thanks to several complete symphony cycles being undertaken in the UK by the London Symphony Orchestra, London Philharmonic Orchestra, Bournemouth Symphony Orchestra and, here in Birmingham, by the City of Birmingham Symphony Orchestra.

The Dallas Symphony Orchestra have had a couple of high-profile guest performers in town for their most recent series of concerts. They presented works by Rachmaninov and Tchaikovsky, a piano concerto and a symphony respectively, in a program that, although disastrously designed, was redeemed by some stellar playing.

There was much to enjoy in this evening's concert by the LSO, who were performing this programme for the second time this week. The two piano concertos of Shostakovich were suitably contrasted - though neither takes itself too seriously, the Second is lighter in character, with a tender slow movement to rival the popular concertos of Rachmaninov.

Shostakovich's first and second piano concertos were coupled with Tchaikovsky's third symphony in the exciting continuation of the LSO's complete Tchaikovsky cycle, under their principal conductor, Valery Gergiev.The concerto for trumpet, piano, and strings (Op. 35) was written in 1933, with Shostakovich playing the piano part at its première in the same year.