The last movement of Mozart's Linz Symphony was a riot of explosive energy in Jeffrey Tate's performance with the English Chamber Orchestra, as the main theme whirled through every section of the orchestra and the music careered to its final bars. It was the climax of an all-Mozart programme celebrating Tate's 60th birthday. A talismanic figure for the ECO, Tate was their first principal conductor in the mid-1980s, and there were signs of his close relationship with the players in the subtlety of phrasing in the slow movement, which grew from a single, simple melody into a searing, dissonant climax.

But for all the genial charm of the rest of the performance, and the polish of the ECO's playing, there was something complacent about Tate's interpretation. He has just completed a recorded cycle of the Mozart symphonies with the orchestra, a project he began two decades ago. But what sounded fresh and insightful in the mid-80s now seems safe and unchallenging. Tate's interpretative restraint and the ECO's musical good manners created a comforting familiarity, but they did not reveal the radical energy, shying away from the obsessive repetitions of the first movement, and the metrical intricacies of the minuet.

There was more imagination in Mitsuko Uchida's performance of Mozart's early E flat major Piano Concerto, K271. This is one of the composer's most volatile concertos, with the piano's cheeky interjection at the start of the first movement, and the slow minuet that appears in the middle of the fast finale. The meditative poetry of Uchida's playing was captivating, but with Tate's timidity, the piece was turned into a cosseting masterpiece rather than an unpredictable work of impetuous youth.