Since the 24-year-old Venezuelan conductor Gustavo Dudamel won the Gustav Mahler conducting competition in Bamberg 20 months ago, he has swept all before him. Deutsche Grammophon have given him a recording contract and he "collaborates" with the likes of Rattle, Abbado and Barenboim, but it is his innate ability to communicate that suggests Dudamel is the genuine article. In this debut with the City of Birmingham Symphony Orchestra, it was very clear that he won the hearts and minds of the players.

In Mendelssohn's Scottish Symphony, Dudamel brought a youthful fire and passion to a work that too often passes in an undistinguished mist. This was a performance that went far beyond its "Burns night" label.

Not that the programme as a whole was an unqualified success. The first half was given over to two more symphonies in which the composers were also inspired by cultures other than their own. Carlos Chavez used Mexican Indian melodies and lively rhythms in his single-movement Sinfonia India of 1936 and, while the percussion section rose nobly to the challenge of conveying texture and colour on instruments that - as sanctioned by Chavez - were not all authentic Mexican, it was only at the pounding climax that the music spoke with real force. In Edouard Lalo's Symphonie Espagnole, effectively a violin concerto, soloist Olivier Charlier highlighted the drama Spanish Gypsy in typically flamboyant style, although the effect was sometimes unfocused. Dudamel partnered him sympathetically.

There can be little doubt as to the excitement Dudamel will generate. In looks, ardour and agility, he would pass for a tenor or a footballer, and the hype risks being comparable and dangerous, but his incisive and disciplined approach suggests a talent that surely deserves to be allowed to burn long and steady.