RTÉ NSO

NCH, Dublin Tues 7th, 14th, 21st, 28th 1.05pm €10 01-4170000

Unless I’m mistaken, it’s been more than 20 years since the RTÉ National Symphony Orchestra last performed any of Dvorak’s late symphonic poems. Now, the four “orchestral ballads” (as the composer called them), which were inspired by the writings of Karel Jaromír Erben, are on offer on four successive Tuesday lunchtimes.

The original tales are fairy- tale, grisly affairs, replete with suicide, eye gouging, child killing and dismembering. In contrast, the music, which finds Dvorak at the height of his powers, is more innocent than dark.

Gavin Maloney conducts the first two concerts, beginning this week with The Water Goblin(along with works by Wagner and Liszt), and continuing next week with The Golden Spinning Wheel(coupled with Mozart's Oboe Concerto, in which the soloist is Adrian Wilson). On September 21st, Philippe Bach couples The Noonday Witchwith Brahms, and the final concert, again conducted by Bach, pairs The Wood Dovewith Janacek's Taras Bulba.