Symphony in B flat, Op 21 No 5 - Boccherini

Musica da concerto - Ghedini

Death and the Maiden Quartet - Schubert

Sunday's concert by the Irish Chamber Orchestra under Bruno Giuranna, newly announced as principal guest conductor, offered musical pleasures that were simple and deep.

Giuranna despatched the Boccherini symphony with energy and elan. To be sure, he missed some of the spirit of the composer's quirky, I-like-this-bit-so-here-it-is-again indulgence in the outer movements. But there was a breezy drive to compensate, and the contours of the slow central movement were touchingly drawn.

Giuranna, who surely has a reasonable claim to being the world's greatest viola player, directed the second work with his instrument under his chin. It was he who gave the premiere of Giorgio Federico Ghedini's finely-wrought, rhapsodic Musica da concerto in 1953, and if the musical idiom did not sound distinctive on a first hearing, Giuranna's miraculous fusing of aristocratic poise and agility, the varied sensuousness of the orchestra's response, and the composer's skill in instrumental combination and colouring all combined to make for a most satisfying experience.

Schubert's Death and the Maiden Quartet can make an unwieldy subject when arranged upwards for string orchestra, even one as small and tightly-knit as the ICO. Inevitably, even they sound a little stiff-jointed when compared to the spontaneous flexion of a first-rate string quartet. Giuranna gauged nicely the challenges of approaching massiveness of sound without becoming over-imposing, his approach inclining towards the effect of a sonorously enlarged quartet rather than the genuinely orchestral contrasts behind the version of Mahler, which originally popularised the idea of Death and the Maiden for massed strings.

The ICO responded to the task with palpable relish, their savoir-faire taking them as safely through some breakneck passages as through moments of half-uttered plaint.