Prometheus Overture - Beethoven
Piano Concerto No 1 - Beethoven
Symphony No 3 (Eroica) - Beethoven
The RTE Concert Orchestra's "Masterworks" series ended last Friday at the National Concert Hall. It closed in the same way it opened six weeks ago, with an all-Beethoven programme in the overture-concerto-symphony format, and with conductor George Hurst.
The first few minutes of the Prometheus Overture set a standard of orchestral discipline which rarely faltered. This was the best performance of the evening. But throughout the concert, balanced tone and volume showed that everyone knew what to do, and that the sound was scaled for the size of the orchestra and for the venue.
In the Piano Concerto No. 1, the soloist was Manchester-born Ronan O'Hora, whose well-measured playing, always concerned with doing justice to the music's subtleties, complemented George Hurst's control of the orchestra and the RTECO's alertness. Yet for music which shows Beethoven as something of a young lion, everything was too genteel.
Even if one did not always agree with the conductor's view of the Eroica symphony, the certainty with which his decisions came across made for a firmly characterised account. The pacing of the slow movement - a steady four-in-a-bar, rather than a slow two - was not always compatible with the spacious way this movement unfolds but the Scherzo was excellently timed and played.
Paradoxically, the defined orchestral sound highlighted occasional problems with ensemble, especially at connections between phrases. But it was rewarding to hear the RTECO in such responsive form, under a conductor who understands this ensemble's potential.
