100% Saint-Saëns for the composer's centenary year at the Philharmonie

By Simon Thompson, 03 March 2021

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“La Princesse jaune... a cracking overture, played with marvellous colour”

Reviewed at Philharmonie de Paris: Grande salle Pierre Boulez, Paris on 3 March 2021

Saint-Saëns, La Princesse jaune (ouverture)

Saint-Saëns, Piano Concerto no. 2 in G minor, Op.22

Saint-Saëns, Danse macabre

Saint-Saëns, Cello Concerto no. 1 in A minor, Op.33

Saint-Saëns, La Muse et le Poète for Violin, Cello and Orchestra, Op.132

Orchestre de Paris

Julien Masmondet, Conductor

Marie-Ange Nguci, Piano

Victor Julien-Laferrière, Cello

Eva Zavaro, Violin

Orchestre de Paris and Mäkelä wow Amsterdam’s Concertgebouw

Max Lima, 18th March

Under its Music Director Klaus Mäkelä, the French orchestra returns to the Concertgebouw for an exhilarating concert with pianist Anna Vinnitskaya.

****1

New season, new horizons: Salonen opens the Elbphilharmonie

Mengguang Huang, 3rd September

Salonen and the Orchestre de Paris opened the Elbphilharmonie season with a vivid journey from Strauss’s dramatic energy, through a reflective new Horn Concerto, to Sibelius’s luminous, precise grandeur.

****1

Rach 4 redefined: Mäkelä and Yunchan Lim set a new benchmark in Seoul

SangKwon Lee, 11th June

In Yunchan Lim’s hands the score to Rachmaninov's Fourth Piano Concerto emerges as a small revelation, conspicuously succeeding where so many others have floundered.

*****

Klaus Mäkelä and the Orchestre de Paris paint vivid pictures in Vienna

Mark Pullinger, 23rd February

Maurice Ravel the orchestrator takes centre stage at the Musikverein in an evening of descriptive aural painting.

****1

Khatia Buniatishvili in search of her lost fingers

Alain Lompech, 30th October

Rachmaninov's Second Piano Concerto turns out to be a shipwreck for the Georgian pianist, despite an admirable Orchestre de Paris and conductor (Kirill Karabits).

*1111

Fresh and flamboyant: Mäkelä and the Orchestre de Paris at the Proms

Mark Thomas, 3rd September

Klaus Mäkelä presents fresh and dynamic takes on French masterpieces from Debussy and Berlioz, the Orchestre de Paris providing colour and vigour in Stravinsky.

*****

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Simon Thompson

Simon lives and works in Edinburgh, and teaches History and Modern Studies at a local high school when he is not writing about music. Born an Irishman, he is an enthusiastic adopted Scot, and has lived in the capital for fifteen years since university days, making the most of its many avenues for classical music. He spends his spare time enthusing about music, theatre, art and literature to anyone who will listen, including his long-suffering students, who have no choice.