Simon Rattle's last appearance with the London Symphony Orchestra was alongside Mr Bean at the London 2012 Olympics opening ceremony. The conductor has since announced his prospective departure from Berlin and the rumour mill has installed him as the LSO's long-term successor to Valery Gergiev. It was hard not to see this characteristically programmed Rattle evening as the shape of possible things to come. If so, roll on 2018. Rattle's penchant for detailed new takes on established pieces can sometimes seem like a compulsion to avoid direct comparison as an interpreter.
At first, his conducting of Beethoven's violin concerto with Veronika Eberle, a highly empathetic soloist, seemed potential evidence for this charge. Initial speeds were erratic and some of the orchestral point-making was close to downright quirky. But the interpretation quickly settled, and Rattle and Eberle probed ever more searchingly under the skin of a concerto which is sometimes treated as merely the quintessence of serenity. Not here, however. Exceptionally delicate dynamics were a hallmark throughout, as both orchestra and soloist spun the first and second movements out into the merest scintillas of sound, which made the closing rondo all the more impressive for being harder won than usual.
After the interval, during which Rattle presented his esteemed manager, Martin Campbell-White, with an honorary Royal Philharmonic Society fellowship, Anna Prohaska gave a crystalline account of Henze's 1963 Rimbaud setting Being Beauteous, accompanied by four London Symphony Orchestra cellists and a harpist under Rattle's sympathetic direction.
But it was the sheer energy and drive that Rattle brought to Schumann's second symphony that made one realise again both what an orchestral technician he is and what an energising influence he could have on the LSO. The orchestra played the symphony from first to last with a commitment and technique that spoke eloquently about the exciting possibilities of a future Rattle era with the orchestra.
