Philharmonia/Salonen: Gurrelieder review – terror, scorn and exquisite excess

Royal Festival Hall, LondonSchoenberg’s landmark cantata was delivered with all its its ominous fervour on a stellar season-closing evening

Philharmonia/Salonen review – Chin’s grand meditations glint but are hard to grasp

Composer Unsuk Chin’s biggest concert work to date reveals her imagination but the choral music here is strangely unadventurous

Philharmonia/Heras-Casado review – ravishing Ravel and magnificent Debussy

Pablo Heras-Casado and Pierre-Laurent Aimard were captivating in an outstanding programme of late 19th- and early 20th-century French music

Holding out for a hero: the spirit of Sibelius is summoned to celebrate Finland’s centenary

Two of the UK’s major orchestras are conducted by Finns, and both men this week turned to their country’s national composer to mark the 100th anniversary of its independence

Philharmonia/Salonen review – inventive energy animates Tansy Davies premiere

The British composer’s four-horn concerto Forest, commissioned for the orchestra’s 70th birthday, is a striking addition to a niche reportoire

Philharmonia/Salonen review – superb UK premiere for rediscovered Stravinsky

Funeral Song, honouring the composer’s teacher Rimsky-Korsakov, led a night that also delivered powerhouse Ligeti from pianist Pierre-Laurent Aimard

Philharmonia/Salonen review – exemplary Stravinsky double bill

Esa-Pekka Salonen’s readings of Oedipus Rex and the Symphony of Psalms were thrilling while Peter Sellars’s staging of the opera-oratorio was deft

Philharmonia/Salonen review – lucid and sensuous genre-bending Stravinsky

The conductor’s performance and some beautifully refined choral singing did justice to the exquisite but rarely heard Perséphone

BBCSSO/Dausgaard; Philharmonia/Salonen at the Proms review

Kirill Gerstein wows with a subtle new version of the composer’s first concerto

Bartók: The Miraculous Mandarin; Dance Suite; Contrasts CD review – meticulous focus meets now-or-never ferocity

Most music doesn’t suit safety, and the stakes are always higher when an orchestra knows it is being recorded live – no studio retakes, no patching (probably). This Bartók disc comes from the Philharmonia’s 2011 Infernal Dance series – and … Continue reading →

Stravinsky Myths & Rituals: Philharmonia – review

Rarely performed pieces inspired by the composer’s faith made for essential listening

Philharmonia/Salonen review – rare Stravinsky from Russia with love

The semi-staged renderings of Renard and Mavra were compelling, but Les Noces could have been presented more clearly

Philharmonia/Salonen – an electrifying start to their Stravinsky season

The Stravinsky: Myths and Rituals series began with new choreography for Agon and a revelatory Rite of Spring

Philharmonia/Blomstedt – joyful Mozart and energetic Bruckner

Blomstedt brought out the best in the Philharmonia Orchestra in a genial and gleaming concert

Philharmonia/Hruša review – ravishing textures and self-conscious languor

Mahler’s metaphysical Third Symphony is arguably his most ambitious and Jakub Hrůša’s reading was remarkable