At the end of his first season as music director, it's too early to predict how Stéphane Denève will influence the development of the RSNO, but the signs look promising. Denève may not be a revolutionary interpreter of the classics, nor a visionary advocate for contemporary music, but he seems to be an orchestra builder. The RSNO likes him and goes where he leads, something that has found voice in the playing, the newfound sense of purpose, the improved ensemble and the warmer, more developed tone that has replaced the often thin, lacklustre sound of old.

Denève seems to have an affinity for orchestral colour, which perhaps explains the attraction of Einojuhani Rautavaara, whose Book of Visions here received its UK premiere. This lengthy piece doesn't so much go nowhere in a hurry as go nowhere at all, with each of the four movements inhabiting the same syrupy sound world, flavoured to reflect the different titles. A Tale of Night has echoes of Bartok's night music in the mysterious timpani slides, while Fire is given flickering woodwind, Love a big violin solo and Fate gets bells and drums. Underneath, though, the music is much the same; the Romanticism of Barber's Adagio overlaid with Rautavaara's characteristic tone clusters, a combined effect that soon sets the teeth on edge.

After 45 minutes of more of the ponderous same, much-needed light relief was provided in the form of Saint-Saëns' effervescent Second Piano Concerto. Jean-Yves Thibaudet was a playfully teasing soloist, nonchalantly sailing through the technical challenges and setting a pace in the finale that the orchestra was hard pressed to match.

It was Debussy's La Mer, though, that demonstrated what an orchestral poem ought to be. What Denève's much-anticipated performance lacked in sudden surges of dynamic and phrasing it made up for in overall shape and developing sense of drama. An upbeat conclusion to the season, it promises interesting work to come.