Boris Berezovsky (piano), Uo/bramwell Tovey

Waterfront Hall, Belfast Tonight 7.45pm £8-£23.50 048-90239955

Waterfront Hall, Belfast Tonight 7.45pm £8-£23.50 048-90239955

IBO/CHRISTIAN CURNYN

CIT Cork School of Music, Cork Tonight 8pm 20 021-4501673; Christ Church Cathedral, Dublin Tomorrow 8pm 25 01-4023518

ICO/ANTHONY MARWOOD (VIOLIN)

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University Concert Hall, Limerick Thurs 8pm 20 061-331549; RDS, Dublin, Sat 25th 8pm 20 0818 719300

If you were disappointed by the cancellation of Boris Berezovsky’s appearance with the RTÉ NSO last April, there’s an opportunity catch up with the Russian pianist tonight, when he plays Rachmaninov’s Fourth Piano Concerto in the opening concert of the Ulster Orchestra’s new season. Bramwell Tovey is the conductor, and also on the programme are Mussorgsky’s Night on Bare Mountain and that greatest of orchestral staples, Beethoven’s Fifth Symphony.

The Irish Baroque Orchestra’s programme for its concerts this weekend

are anything but staple. Yes, there are a few great names (Purcell and Handel), but otherwise the period players under Christian Curnyn (above) are offering a symphony by William Boyce; a concerto grosso by Richard Mudge;

and a suite from Apollon Enjoué by Johann Kusser, a composer of Hungarian parentage who arrived in Dublin in 1707. He worked in TCD and was “Master of the Musick attending his Majesty’s State in Ireland”.

The Irish Chamber Orchestra follows its regional tour of Vivaldi’s Four Seasons with the opening of its concert season. ICO artistic director Anthony Marwood is the soloist in Beethoven’s Violin Concerto and also conducts Beethoven’s First Symphony and the fifth of the “Little” symphonies that Darius Milhaud wrote in the 1920s: six minutes of music for 10 wind players.

Michael Dervan

Michael Dervan

Michael Dervan is a music critic and Irish Times contributor