Grooving with The Dude: the Bolívars make Bernstein and Falla dance

Gustavo Dudamel and the Simón Bolívar Symphony Orchestra

By Mark Pullinger, 29 August 2025

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“slick and snappy, full of rhythmic precision, this was a pulsating drive”

Reviewed at Royal Festival Hall, London on 28 August 2025

Bernstein, Candide: Overture

Falla, Noches en los jardines de España (Nights in the Gardens of Spain)

Falla, El Amor brujo: Danza ritual del fuego

Falla, The Three-Cornered Hat: Suite no. 2

Bernstein, West Side Story: Symphonic Dances

Strauss II, Tritsch-Tratsch-Polka, Op. 214 "Triqui Traqui" (arr. by Paul Desenne)

Bernstein, West Side Story: Mambo

Gutierrez, Alma llanera

Javier Perianes, Piano

Simón Bolívar Symphony Orchestra of Venezuela

Gustavo Dudamel, Conductor

Simón Bolívar Orchestra and Dudamel celebrate El Sistema

Roy Westbrook, 16th January

An evening of audience roars begins as soon as Gustavo Dudamel first mounts the podium at the Barbican.

****1

An Edinburgh night to remember as Dudamel returns to the Simón Bolívar

David Smythe, 26th August

The Simón Bolívar Symphony Orchestra, Gustavo Dudamel and cuatro player Jorge Glem set the Edinburgh International Festival alight with a mix of Venezuelan music and a terrific Mahler 1.

*****

Dudamel conquers Barcelona with Beethoven

Pep Gorgori, 13th March

In Barcelona, Gustavo Dudamel and Simón Bolívar Symphony Orchestra of Venezuela continued their Beethoven cycle with performances of the Fifth and Sixth.

*****

Dudamel and the Bolívars: a “socks-on” kind of ensemble

Jacob Slattery, 7th October

Maestro Gustavo Dudamel and the musicians of the Simón Bolívar Symphony Orchestra are undoubtedly the most prominent ambassadors for Venezuelan orchestral music today, and they hit the stage on Friday for their second night at Carnegie Hall’s opening weekend.

***11

Cecilia Bartoli as Maria in Salzburg

Jonathan Sutherland, 13th May

A case of “seeing double” in Salzburg, as Cecilia Bartoli brings West Side Story to her Whitsun Festival.

***11

“Beer and beard”: Barenboim’s ruminative Brahms

Mark Pullinger, 17th January

An ambitious undertaking to perform both Brahms' piano concertos on the same programme, but not one that succeeded in this performance at the Royal Festival Hall.

**111

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Mark Pullinger

Mark has been a Bachtrack editor since 2014. He is also an experienced critic, writing hundreds of reviews for the site, as well as a freelancer writing for other magazines and newspapers. He also writes programme notes and blogs on Substack. Mark has a particular passion for the operas of Verdi as well as Russian and French repertoire. Outside the concert hall and opera house, Mark enjoys cooking and travel and is probably at his happiest let loose in a French patisserie or a Viennese coffee house.