Auckland Philharmonia at the Town Hall

By HEATH LEES

AUCKLAND TOWN HALL - You couldn't get a seat last Thursday at the launch of the orchestra's flagship Royal SunAlliance series. People were streaming around like semiquavers at the end of a Beethoven symphony. Getting into the hall itself called for a cry of victory.

But it was worth it, thanks to the Town Hall's air-conditioning, which is at last working the way it should. Not only was the place mercifully cool, but the system was silent.

Oh yes, the music. There was a Berlioz overture, the colourful Roman Carnival, complete with magical cor anglais solo and distant tambourines.

Conductor Miguel Harth-Bedoya, demonstrating his increasingly assured rapport with this orchestra (and his new three-year contract, just signed), kept the players on a tight rein, building up the tension till the last few pages where the trombones and trumpets broke away for the sprint towards the jubilant ending.

Brahms doesn't always come off well with this orchestra, and his Violin Concerto, which followed, was sometimes flat - in effect as well as in the intonation of the soloist (Kurt Nikkanen), whose violin seemed to have failed the dreaded Auckland humidity test and was giving tuning problems.

Still, the marvellous first-movement cadenza came alive, and even if the finale had little Hungarian zest about it, the slow movement that preceded it had beautiful moments.

The orchestra sounded lumpy and uninterested - there was no really glowing phrases, or sudden lighting up from behind. It was more a question of just playing the notes.

But the Tchaikovsky Fifth Symphony that formed the second half was electrifying.

Given that the strings are a little thin (the increase in double basses helps, but the cellos sound light when full power is called for), the rich detail of the inner parts came through clearly and added enormously to what are some of Tchaikovsky's most inspired melodies.

At every entry, brass and woodwind soloists were in top form. It was a great start for a series that's now part of Auckland's life.