Youth was a hindrance rather than a virtue in this testosterone-driven performance which sought more than anything to sock the audience between the eyes
The Royal Philharmonic Orchestra provided a formidable performance of Shostakovich's Seventh Symphony under Marin Alsop, with Renaud Capuçon bringing warmth and joie de vivre to Mendelssohn.
Sofia Gubaidulina has always been drawn to non-traditional sounds, something which invariably landed her in trouble during the Soviet era. The bayan, a 200-button Russian accordion, became the source for many of those sounds in solo and concerted pieces. “It breathes,” she has said, possessing an “earthy quality like no other instrument”.
It's not plain-sailing in Lupu's Beethoven, but Järvi's clear-sighted and controlled approach and the Staatskapelle's high-quality playing make for especially musical Shostakovich after the interval.
The return of Andris Nelsons for the Seventh in his complete cycle of Shostakovich symphonies with the Royal Concertgebouw Orchestra demonstrated yet again the marvelous chemistry between the two.
Let’s not beat about the bush: the BBC Symphony Orchestra wouldn’t rank among my top ten orchestras in the world. Semyon Bychkov, however, has a transformative power over its players and in a monumentally impressive account of Dmitri Shostakovich’s Leningrad Symphony, Bychkov made the BBCSO truly sound one of the world’s greats.
Baldur Brönnimann conducted a storming performance of Shostakovich's “Leningrad” Symphony after a bold and original Tchaikovsky First Piano Concerto from Ryan Drucker.
The idea that war is hell is certainly not a new one. Shostakovich may not have had knowledge of the quote's original context, but he was no stranger to the atrocities caused by war.
Martinů’s Concerto for Two Pianos and Orchestra is a lively, catchy piece, and was played as such by the Labèque sisters and the BBC Symphony Orchestra under Semyon Bychkov. Shostakovich’s Symphony no. 7 is, however, long, heavy and disquieting.
Prokofiev’s Third Piano Concerto and Shostakovich’s “Leningrad” symphony were wonderfully played by the Orchestre de Paris and Alexander Toradze at the Salle Pleyel, despite Mikko Franck's last-minute cancellation.
Sir Mark Elder conducted the Hallé in a moving account of Shostakovich’s mighty Leningrad symphony and was joined by actor Samuel West for a Britten world première at Manchester’s Bridgewater Hall.
In terms of Mozart’s piano concerti, K482 is known less for its intrinsic musical quality than its predecessor (K467) and its successor (K488), but it is more famous due to the unusual circumstances of its public introduction.
A neighbour at a recent visiting orchestra’s Edinburgh Festival concert asked me what I thought of the atonal frenzy in the pre-performance free-for-all; warm-up scales mingled with sneak peeks at tricky passages. My response was that a school orchestra would not be allowed to do this.
When Simon Rattle left the CBSO in 1998 predictions of the orchestra's imminent demise came flooding in from the press. Sakari Oramo, who filled Rattle's shoes, achieved what everyone thought was impossible, further honing the CBSO's sound, using his knowledge and expertise as a violinist to give the strings more polish and precision than they'd previously had.
The RSNO and Conductor Laureate Neeme Järvi attracted a very large audience for Friday’s concert in the Usher Hall, Edinburgh. The vigorous applause welcoming Järvi to the rostrum suggested that it was the conductor himself who had drawn in the crowds as much as the repertoire, which was to cover Dvořák's Serenade for Strings and Shostakovich’s Symphony No. 7 (Leningrad).
Tras una recepción algo fría en el Baluarte, la Joven Orquesta Nacional de España consiguió, junto a una calurosa interpretación del trompetista Manuel Blanco y una clamorosa Leningrado bajo la batuta de Pehlivanian, arrancar el entusiasmo del público.
