Concert Review: Auckland Philharmonia, Auckland Town Hall

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It would be difficult to imagine a more sure-fire box office draw than a Tchaikovsky-Sibelius double bill.

And pairing the Russian composer's First Piano Concerto and the Finn's Second Symphony drew a predictably impressive audience to Auckland Philharmonia Orchestra's Thursday concert.

Latin good looks and a volatile playing style gave pianist Sergio Tiempo a dashing stage presence and his approach to Tchaikovsky's venerable warhorse was nothing if not idiosyncratic.

Within minutes, his emphatic rubato created a sometimes uneasy tension in tempo between the pianist and the orchestra, under the able baton of Michal Dworzynski.

The Argentinian-Venezuelan pianist gave us flash and fire, but not without the occasional brutality.

In the first movement, an Allegro con spirito came with jabs of sound; by the Andantino simplice, some of the composer's dynamic markings were being wilfully reversed.

Tchaikovsky was not afraid to hurl open the emotional floodgates.

But Tiempo's excessively swooping dynamics became an irritating mannerism, even if they did create a vigorous sense of musical contest coming from the stage.

Sibelius' Second Symphony was provocative in its time, particularly with its boldly fragmented first movement. Here, the composer likened his method of writing to the Almighty throwing down pieces of a mosaic from Heaven's floor and asking him to put them together.

This is a challenge for any conductor, and Dworzynski obviously relished the chance to bring a real sense of cohesion and inevitability to it all, which he did.

Here and there, orchestral definition could have been sharper. The horn section in particular was not always at its best, although strings startled with some searing outbursts and woodwind brought a real vibrancy to their lines.

This young conductor has made his name in Europe with his advocacy of contemporary Polish music and, in the Auckland Town Hall, one felt as if one was hearing this Sibelius work for the first time, 109 years ago.

With the musicians also conveying this thrill of the new, even the big tune of the symphony's finale may have jolted a few complacent concertgoers.