| Date and venue | Title |
|---|---|
| 27-Apr-2013 Southbank Centre: Royal Festival Hall | Music from dark times: London Philharmonic Orchestra at The Rest is Noise |
 Tonight’s concert was a prime example of the solid programming of Southbank Centre’s The Rest is Noise festival. The concert, titled “Music from Dark Times”, included pieces by Webern, Berg, Bartók and Martinů, written between 1934 and 1941, which were indeed dark times for all these composers. In Vladimir Jurowski’s introduction, the conductor explained that this was one the most challenging evenings of the year for him and the orchestra.Read full review... | |
| 8-May-2012 Barbican Centre: Hall | The Agony and the Ecstasy: LSO Performs Bartók and Szymanowski |
 Every now and then I like to experiment. Reviewing a concert in which I know none of the music can be frightening, but also exciting and – always – surprising. Thus I was slightly apprehensive but wholly enthusiastic about attending this LSO concert featuring works unknown to me by Bartók and Szymanowski. And after all, this music is not immediate, with show-stopping, crowd-pulling, radio-playing-in-the-background “listenability”.Read full review... | |
| 4-Apr-2012 BBC Hoddinott Hall | BBC National Orchestra of Wales: Stravinsky, Beethoven, Bartók |
 The announcement by the presenter that Stravinsky did not intend Symphonies of Wind Instruments to please the audience or arouse their passions was greeted with titters of laughter. An overheard conversation during the interval signalled that the number of late arrivals to the concert was suspected to be ‘because they didn’t want to sit through the Stravinsky’. Yet the warmth of the applause demonstrated what a commendable performance this was, and that the time is ripe for performances of Stravinsky’s more challenging repertoire.Read full review... | |
| 29-Mar-2012 Kimmel Center for Performing Arts, Verizon Hall | Esa-Pekka Salonen with the Philadelphia Orchestra |
 When a guest conductor arrives for a few concerts with an orchestra, he or she doesn’t have very much time to shape his or her interpretation. On some occasions the orchestra successfully adopts the visitor’s style; on others they just play like they always do. In Esa-Pekka Salonen’s concert with the Philadelphia Orchestra last night, the program of Debussy, Bartók, and the Finnish conductor’s own Violin Concerto was more the maestro’s style (cool modernist) than the orchestra’s (rather conservative and Romantic). The playing, however, was mostly typically Philadelphia.Read full review... | |
