Edward Bhesania ventures to London’s Royal Festival Hall on 18 February 2026 for the performance of Tchaikovsky, Sibelius Previn and Beethoven
It’s hard to believe that this year marks the 50th anniversary of Anne-Sophie Mutter’s performing career. She may have seemed slightly uneasy during the orchestral introduction to Tchaikovsky’s Violin Concerto, but she entered with impressive warmth, helped by a high and generous bowing arm. Add to this a range of tonal colouring and refreshing touches of supple rubato (the LPO and Canellakis following her every move, limpet-like) and it was no surprise that whoops leapt out from the audience after the first movement.
The second movement opened with a heartfelt narrative quality, Mutter at first bringing us into her confidence and later relaxing into sweetness. As the last movement proved, Mutter lacks nothing in terms of focus, strength and precision, qualities that were keenly matched by the orchestra. After a brief address to the audience in which she spoke of music’s purpose in a ‘troubled and divided world’, her encore was the violin-and-orchestra arrangement by her former husband André Previn of Song from his Tango Song and Dance – violinist and orchestra revelling in its lyrical post-Strauss, post-Korngold idiom.
In the remainder of the concert Sibelius’s Pohjola’s Daughter was a little short on magical atmosphere, but Beethoven’s Symphony no.7 – with the tang and bluster of natural trumpets and period timpani – came over with fresh insights and winning vitality.
EDWARD BHESANIA
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