Wednesday, March 25, 2026
Concert Hall, Helsinki Music Centre, Mannerheimintie 13 A, 00100 Helsinki, Finland
The ‘Eroica’ occupied the concert’s second half – self-proclaiming Emperor Napoleon losing Beethoven’s intended dedication – Nicholas Collon and the Finnish Radio Symphony Orchestra firing on all cylinders for a fast-paced first movement, fleet of tempo if not fiery enough in temperament, partly due to ‘period’ manners (e.g. strings without vibrato), although woodwinds were in relief, and twee timpani rattled things along, yet timbrally there was a lack of heft, and structural size (despite Collon observing the repeat). Something more magisterial (Böhm, Celibidache, Klemperer) is needed if this opener is to avoid seeming compacted. Similarly, the succeeding ‘Funeral March’ lacked gravitas, whereas the Scherzo had poise within the nippy framework, setting a potential tempo-related problem for the horns in the Trio, if, in reality, unfounded. The Finale – at times glib, clear-sighted or surprisingly spacious – led to a coda that was an exuberant rallying call.
Beginning the evening, Grażyna Bacewicz’s Pensieri notturni (1961), ‘night thoughts’ rarefied and enigmatic scored for a small if colourful ensemble – flecks of harp, xylophone bangs, an eerie celesta if a dulcet saxophone, sinister bow-taps and slithers on strings, apparitions suggested, certain innovative/strange sonorities shared with her fellow-Pole Lutosławski, fitted in to a restless seven minutes. There are nocturnal references in the second movement of the Bartók, for which Leonidas Kavakos was in focussed form, a virtuosic music-serving account, an exacting collaboration with the FRSO and its conductor, flexible in approach, bristling with detail, bringing out exotic song and dance, always a just balance between precision and expressiveness, the first-movement cadenza integrated into its surrounds, the work’s ultimate coda cumulative for which Kavakos went with the standard version, in which the soloist plays to the end, as Zoltán Székely on first night, March 23,1939 (there is an alternative page, which jettisons the violinist and inserts a brass passage, as recorded by Mullova with Salonen, and Zukerman with Slatkin). For an extra, Bach, a movement from a Partita or a Sonata – not sure what exactly, but certainly JSB – devised in two parts, Kavakos repeating both – with playing cool yet communicative.
Amsterdam Concertgebouw Orchestra; March 23, 1939.