Sound of the future

IT'S always been depressing how mediocrely the NSO responds to some of the mediocre conducting talents that RTE management has put in front of them. And, contrariwise, it's always been exhilarating how quickly the orchestra has responded and transformed itself under the right source of inspiration.

Over the last few years, one of the most fruitful inspirations has been Alexander Anissimov, the current principal guest conductor, who, it was announced last night, is to become the actual principal conductor from September 1998.

The formal announcement was made just in advance oft last night's concert, so a special musical charge might have been expected from the occasion, as Anissimov faced the challenge of the most mainstream of non-Russian programmes he has yet presented to a Dublin audience. If anyone had been nurturing doubts about Anissimov's success in this area, those concerns must have been thoroughly put to rest last night.

Smetana's Bartered Bride Overture was fleet as you could wish, firecracker bright, and every bit as festive. In Mozart's Piano Concerto in C K467, Anissimov showed a steadier, slightly weightier manner than we usually hear in this piece in Dublin nothing throwaway, nothing merely pretty.

The soloist here was John O'Conor, generous in filling out fermatas and adding embellishments, sometimes too much so, for my taste. The rapid passagework of the finale seemed a little skittery, but the pianist was fully at home in the soft radiance of the slow movement.

By comparison with Vladimir Altschuler, who conducted Brahms's Second Symphony last week, Anissimov in the Third showed himself in general to be an unobtrusively perceptive Brahmsian, favouring "a presentation that was controlled and sinewy rather than billowing and fat.

Not everything in his vision of the piece fell into place, however, as the first violins showed a reluctance to whisper, the woodwind a reticence in raising their voices at key moments and the horns a shyness in asserting themselves unequivocally. But, at this key juncture, Anissimov and his players give the impression of facing into an exciting future with a well founded sense of partnership and quest.