Joseph Swensen has given some excellent concerts with the Hallé Orchestra in recent years, and not all the blame for the patchiness of this concert can be laid at his door. To begin with, Paul Lewis took a while to settle into Beethoven's Third Piano Concerto, sounding ill at ease for much of the first movement. But the biggest disappointment here was the deadpan delivery of both soloist and orchestra. Lyrical passages, though gracefully played, sagged rather too languidly, while the most exuberant moments of the first movement were flattened out.

As far as the Hallé went, this was in part a response to Lewis's measured, controlled style, in part concern not to swamp him. Yet it is precisely this kind of pseudo-authentic performance that fails on all levels. Merely repressing a full-sized orchestra doesn't make for exciting playing; nor does reining in a nine-foot Steinway. Where the Hallé strings have sounded taut and vibrant in classical repertoire over the past few years, they were decidedly colourless here. However, Lewis's lovely playing in the slow movement salvaged things a little, and by the finale both he and Swensen had recovered their sparkle.

Written towards the end of the second world war, Copland's Third Symphony is about as shameless a piece of propaganda as anything produced by the Soviet Union at around the same time, but without the dark hues of Shostakovich and Prokofiev. Its inability to surprise is as serious a flaw as its disinclination to any kind of conflict or shock, and that one-dimensionality takes its toll on players as well as listeners: the Hallé sounded tired towards the end despite the music's bombast.

Nielsen's radiant Helios Overture, however, was beautifully judged and performed. It has all Nielsen's favourite ingredients: luxuriant horn unisons and delicious major-minor shifting in the strings, all irresistibly buoyant without once feeling overdone.