Reviewer's rating: 3 out of 5 stars

Natalie Chee

Delivered a glowing solo performance ... guest concertmaster Natalie Chee.

Reviewer rating:

Rating: 3 out of 5 stars

Reader rating:

Rating: 4 out of 5 stars (56 votes)

Opera House, August 1

NICHOLAS ANGELICH touched the keyboard apprehensively during the opening orchestral tutti section of Brahms's Piano Concerto No. 1 in D minor, Opus 15, as though to reassure himself that it was anchored securely enough for the first movement's mood of heaven-shaking tempest.

The gesture was repeated diffidently at the finale, after the piano has said its final word and the orchestra is left to reverberate to a close, as though Angelich was unsure whether to add just one last cadenza.

But there was nothing diffident while he played. In a work whose textures can sometimes sound awkward and not quite in control, this was a performance of impressive firmness and clarity where the ideas were presented with musicianly respect for shape and purpose.

Angelich's temperament might be characterised as scrupulous and thorough, rather than incisive, and the tempos were judicious without surging forward. The sound he projected from the piano emphasised a keen edge, which gave it valuable cutting power in the more diffuse textures. Sometimes, however, this was at the expense of depth and warmth (it was difficult to judge how much of this was due to the instrument and how much to the pianist's calculations).

The first movement was broadly paced, the second played with sensitive and intimate musicality, and in the last there was attentive care, sometimes at the expense of dynamism.

The conductor, Jakub Hrusa, who had stepped in at short notice due to the illness of Tugan Sokhiev, provided a highly spirited opening to the second half in Dvorak's Carnival Overture, Opus 92, with strong orchestral unanimity.

It was a pleasure to welcome back Australian violinist Natalie Chee as guest concertmaster, and her solo in the final work, Rachmaninoff's Symphonic Dances, had a richly golden glowing sound.

This performance has hugely rewarding passages, such as the woodwind interlude of the first movement. There was finely burnished saxophone playing from Christina Leonard and a fine acidic edge to the dense brass chords, but also some occasional misfirings, as at the close of the Walpurgis-like finale.