What: Auckland Philharmonia Orchestra — Russian Tales
Where: Auckland Town Hall
Auckland Philharmonia Orchestra and Xian Zhang have, during 14 years of playing together, cemented an enviable reputation with Russian composers ranging from familiar Tchaikovsky to Mussorgsky's Songs and Dances of Death and Stravinsky's The Rite of Spring.
The Russian Tales concert may not have had the most adventurous programming but exceptional performances vindicated the curious, almost primal power, of the musical warhorse.
One sighed at the merciless repetitions in Tchaikovsky's Marche Slave but, thanks to Zhang's finessed textures, imaginative orchestration saved the evening. This woman is fascinating to watch, arms outstretched, a source of inexhaustible energy; grandeur is unleashed when required but, with a flick of the fingers, Zhang gives us a taste of the whimsical.
She's conducted Tchaikovsky's Violin Concerto with soloist Arabella Steinbacher before and, in this concert, one detected a powerful communion between them.
Steinbacher was admirably unflustered by Tchaikovsky's draconian demands with Zhang underpinning the expansive first movement with impressive structural support. The central Canzonetta was meltingly tender, woodwind as shapely and sonorous as could be.
Steinbacher's encore was a thrillingly fierce rendition of Ysaye's "Obsession", an eerie tangle of solo Bach and an ominous Dies irae.
Zhang recently described Rimsky-Korsakov' Scheherazade as the ultimate orchestral showcase and here it certainly was. Punctuated by Andrew Beer's eloquent violin, we were given a magic carpet ride in sound, with all the splashings and lashings of colour that this most Technicolour and Panavision of scores demands.
Spectacle, however, was not all. Zhang also highlighted the cool beauty of solo weavings in the first movement and, with sumptuous strings portraying the young lovers in the third movement, reminded us that the original 1001 Nights is one of the masterpieces of erotic literature.
