Auckland Philharmonia at the Auckland Town Hall

Reviewed by WILLIAM DART

Tango Milonga, the last concert of the Auckland Philharmonia's spring season, opened with a classic. Carlos Gardel's Volver set the style for the evening with its special blend of cool and hot, refinement and passion that is the tango.

Conductor Miguel Harth-Bedoya challenged us in the first half of the concert, even if two extracts from Astor Piazzolla's Las cuatro estaciones portenas did not seem as compact as they had been when the work turned up in the AP's main series a few months back. Nevertheless, Leonid Desyatnikov's dazzling arrangements still worked their magic when soloist Justine Cormack's violin soared against waves of sighing glissandi.

Piazzolla's Bandoneon Concerto is a subtle, substantial score that catches the Argentian composer's Nuevo Tango in all its light and shade. The soloist here was the debonair young Horacio Romo, all concentration as he manoeuvred his instrument (an Argentinian accordion) between two microphones, intently weaving his melodies and rhythms around those of the orchestra.

His sense of line - so important in this very Stravinskian work - was impeccable and the precision of his playing inspired some of the AP's best work of the evening.

Soloist and conductor presented the same concerto in last year's BBC Proms, and in February perform it in LA's Disney Hall. Auckland is privileged to have been on the itinerary.

After interval, Harth-Bedoya made an argument for Piazzolla's Tangazo as something of a symphonic poem but, alas, a feeble opening from the lower strings forced the orchestra to work all the harder to recoup the piece's obsessional energy.

The rest of the concert, with piano centre stage, was more informal, especially when Romo took a snappy Tango Quartet through their paces, including Piazzolla's shivery Fuga y misterio along the way.

A troupe of dancers accompanied many shorter pieces, coping bravely with the limited space available, although a flying leg once seemed perilously close to the first violins.

By the end of the concert there was the feeling of a party to it all, closing with cheers, bravos and a lively encore of La Cumparasita.

Perhaps if shoes and stamina were up to it, and the pavements tiled, many of the audience would have happily tangoed to their waiting transport.