Intérprete: Lorin Maazel

The Philharmonia Orchestra delivers electrifiying readings of two very different late Romantic classics, in a thrilling concert, marred only by a pedestrian intepretation of Mozart's Violin Concerto no. 3.

Silences felt like the pillars in Lorin Maazel's reading of Sibelius' Symphony No.2 and the results were astonishing.

The day after Lorin Maazel conducted the Munich Philharmonic Orchestra in Benjamin Britten’s War Requiem last month, an estimated 140,000 fans read the blog post he wrote entitled “When Will We Stop the Slaughter”.

Lorin Maazel and the Vienna Philharmonic Orchestra have a very close relationship. In fact, if they were a married couple they would have celebrated their golden anniversary in 2012, having survived and lived to tell the tale of a 50-year collaboration.

The Vienna Philharmonic under Lorin Maazel brought a superb performance of Bruckner’s mighty Eighth Symphony to the penultimate night of the Proms, after a selection of Bach organ works from Klaus Sonnleitner.Clichés abound in writing about Bruckner symphonies. One which cannot be escaped, however, is the necessity for an absolutely solid grasp of long structure.

I often think of Lorin Maazel as the American equivalent of Sir Colin Davis – they are both in their eighties and they both deliver steady, reliable interpretations that let the music speak for itself. Maazel’s return performance with the New York Philharmonic on Saturday re-affirmed my view.