NCH, Dublin

Beethoven

– Symphony No 2.

Barber

– Knoxville: Summer of 1915.

Tchaikovsky

– Violin Concerto; 1812 Overture

Samuel Barber – whose centenary the RTÉ National Symphony Orchestra has been marking – was born in 1910. He was therefore a boy of five in 1915, the year commemorated by Tennessee poet James Agee in his autobiographical fragment Knoxville: Summer of 1915.Agee was also a boy in 1915. Writer and composer both look back with affection and nostalgia upon the comfort and innocence of their American boyhoods. The result is a beautifully sympathetic piece of word-setting for voice and orchestra. From the lazy opening bars the listener is transported to a different time and culture, and to that sense of relief in summer evenings in the South when the oppressive heat has abated enough that people can "sit on their porches, rocking gently and talking gently and watching the street."

Irish soprano Mairéad Buicke nicely evoked the voice of childhood with sweet, warm-hearted singing and a tender delight in the text. Conductor Takuo Yuasa was in his element, shaping a foundation of warmth and soft focus, yet picking out detail and then finding a new depth of expression when the boy Agee – as children so often do – finds his thoughts drifting to deep philosophical ones. Contrasting Yuasa’s skill in shaping Barber’s soft lines was his quicksilver execution in the high-speed outer movements of Beethoven’s zesty Symphony No 2 – this despite electing to go with a full string complement.

Nicola Benedetti was soloist in the Tchaikovsky Violin Concerto, whose immense popular familiarity demands flawless performance. This the celebrated Scottish violinist virtually delivered, always apparently with complete ease, in a performance in which she and Yuasa scaled Tchaikovsky’s romantic sweep and flow in sensitive partnership.

To my mind, initially, it seemed a pity to unbalance such a well-judged programme with a concluding potboiler. However, Yuasa's irrepressible take on the 1812 Overturefound the NSO in flying form and closed the evening with smiles all round. In Limerick tomorrow, Cork on Thursday and Waterford on Friday