Philharmonia Orchestra, Petrenko, Royal Festival Hall

Petrenko's thrilling Shostakovich strips away all ambivalence

by Edward SeckersonFriday, 13 November 2009

Vasily Petrenko: the Russian Scouser storms London

It is quickly apparent when you are in the company of exceptional talent. In even the most hackneyed repertoire nothing is quite as you expect it to be: there’s a charge in the air, phrasings take on a different urgency, textures are opened up and newly revealed. And on this night, certain revelations concerning Shostakovich’s 5th Symphony were, under the exciting baton of Vasily Petrenko, no longer conjecture but irrefutable fact.

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