Article published in Manchester Evening News 22 May 2015

MAY half-term is when nothing happens on the north west classical music scene, so I’m looking back at four performances. 

First Manchester Camerata’s unusual concert in Manchester Cathedral, with Gábor Takács-Nagy conducting and Dejan Lazić as pianist.  

The string players, led by Katie Stillman, made music of extraordinary quality in Britten’s Young Apollo,  Barber’s Adagio For Strings and Mahler’s version of Beethoven’s ‘Serioso’ quartet. 

In Chopin’s Piano Concerto No. 2 (in strings-only garb) Lazić re-created the mystic Chopin and the orchestra responded with tenderness.  

Equally unforgettable was the final concert of the Ravel & Rachmaninov festival at the Bridgewater Hall. Four great pianists in four great works for piano with orchestra (the BBC Philharmonic under conductor Andrew Gourlay). 

Ravel came first: the Concerto in G major, played by Noriko Ogawa, and the Concerto For The Left Hand, with Martin Roscoe.  

Ogawa brought delicacy (and purity) – and Roscoe’s achievement was musically remarkable as well as technically. 

Rachmaninov was represented by his fourth piano concerto, with Kathryn Stott the eloquent protagonist, and his Rhapsody On A Theme Of Paganini, with Peter Donohoe, whose playing was as fluent (and beautifully shaped) as any I’ve heard. 

Later came two superb Bridgewater Hall concerts. Markus Stenz’s Thursday programme with the Hallé began with The Unanswered Question, by Charles Ives, in near-total darkness, the strings sounding ethereally from high in the auditorium.  

The world premiere of Helen Grime’s Double Concerto For Clarinet And Trumpet followed (the Hallé’s own Lynsey Marsh and Gareth Small), full of a fastidious sense of textures and varied ideas. But Stenz’s account of Walton’s first symphony was the highspot.  

Liveliness, intensity – and the Hallé precise, confident and viscerally thrilling.  

The BBC Philharmonic, under Juanjo Mena’s baton, gave Beethoven’s Fidelio in concert.

 The splendours of the orchestral score were revealed in high-def glory, while Stephen Richardson (Rocco) was a living character as well as a warm and admirable singer, and Detlef Roth sang the evil Don Pizarro with force and malice. Manchester-trained Rebecca von Lipinski was the star of the show as Leonore and Stuart Skelton outstanding in the testing role of Florestan. 

By the end Juanjo Mena was whipping the faster speeds along with all the enthusiasm worthy of a modern Beethoven expert, and the performance ended with excitement reaching dizzy heights. 

It was quite a night.