Classical review: Moscow State Symphony Orchestra, Perth
Moscow State Symphony Orchestra
Perth Concert Hall
* * * *
There’s a certain way, too, that Russian orchestras make this music so much their own. A brass sound that cuts the air like a knife, woodwind with cloying individual attitude, the fearless cut-throat bravado of the percussion, and strings whose fiery energy is edged with a steely coldness.
It was all there in an opening half that prefaced Tchaikovsky’s Piano Concerto No 1 with the dizzy eccentricities of Rimsky Korsakov’s suite from his opera The Tale of Tsar Saltan.
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Hide AdThe focus, though, was on the Tchaikovsky and the young Tatiana Kolesova, a pianist of the old Russian stock whose performance was power-driven in the extreme. There was poetry, too, in the more reflective lyrical passages, though lacking just a little in genuine singing tone.
More Tchaikovsky in the second half – the whirling inferno that is his Dantesque Francesca da Rimini – and the most sizzling performance of the evening. Before that, two short pieces by Khachaturian – the adagio from Spartacus and the wild frenzy of the waltz from Masquerade – were the perfect aperitif.