Italian Serenade - Hugo Wolf

Piano Concerto - Samuel Barber

Harold in Italy - Berlioz

Samuel Barber's piano concerto from 1960 is a work full of feeling and harmonic imagination. Languid melodies and sultry orchestration in the first two movements give way to transatlantic pzazz in the last. The finale surmounts its rather one-dimensional content by its sheer energy; and, when the taxing solo part is treated to such elegant and effortless playing as it was in this BBC Invitation Concert by Leon McCawley, and he is given such positive support by the Ulster Orchestra under Hirokami, the results can be very enjoyable.

Hirokami conducted a dramatic, clean-cut performance of the final "Brigands' Orgy" in the Berlioz. By this stage in the work the composer has more or less forgotten about the featured viola soloist. One reason why there aren't more viola solos in the repertoire is that the instrument, by its nature, does not dominate. Yet this concert featured another able violist, the orchestra's principal viola, Ashley Mason, in the Wolf Italian Serenade.