Harrison Birtwistle's 1987 score Endless Parade was commissioned by the legendary Paul Sacher, and its Zurich premiere was conducted by him, linking the piece with some of the seminal works of the 20th century.

This symbolic connection was honoured when Sacher's Swiss compatriots Thierry Fischer and trumpeter Philippe Schartz performed Endless Parade with members of the BBC National Orchestra of Wales in this contemporary programme.

The title reflects Birtwistle's encounter with a festive parade in the medieval Italian town of Lucca, and the various aural perspectives afforded by meeting the jostling procession at different junctures. It is the tension between conjunction and disjunction of ideas which drives the musical process and the energy created in the interface of trumpet and chamber strings was positively bristling.

However, it was the dynamic of the relationship between trumpet and vibraphone, the other instrument in the lineup - and as such a sort of mediator - which made the spine tingle. The vibraphone fired off fierce volleys of notes, but sometimes acted almost as an echo, or alter ego, taking up a single note just as the trumpet breaks off in a way that left the sound reverberating in a rainbow haze. The exquisite poise that Birtwistle achieves in such moments was certainly realised, with Schartz's brilliant playing rivalling that of its first executor, Hakan Hardenberger.

The spatial element present in Endless Parade came to the fore in Simon Holt's Icarus Lamentations. Either side of a small group of strings, two clarinets were equal protagonists in an antiphonal engagement, but it was the collusion of the cimbalom, jangly and exotic, with the harp which fuelled an ongoing tension, magically dissolving at the end.

With Fischer also bringing his incisive hand to Michael Berkeley's Gethsemani Fragment for strings, this was a rewarding evening.