Berne Symphony Orchestra – St George’s Hall

THE SEVENTH and last of the concerts in the current Bradford International Concert Season had a strong German flavour.

There was an overture and piano concerto by Ludwig van Beethoven and a symphony by Johannes Brahms.

The Egmont overture, the best-known item of Beethoven’s Opus 84 incidental music, sounded in very good shape and prepared us for an excellent account of the same composer’s second piano concerto.

Less well-known that the famous Emperor, it is an early work of immense charm, and the crystal-clear tone of Bradford’s gleaming concert grand piano was caressed beautifully by the young Swiss soloist Oliver Schnyder.

After the interval the concert’s main work, Brahms’s second symphony in D minor, was powerfully delivered by the evening’s orchestra, the Swiss German-speaking Berne Symphony Orchestra, and their recently-appointed conductor Mariel Mario.

The substantial first movement included all of the composer’s deliberate repeats to fine effect.

The habitually slow second movement was meltingly lovely, one of Brahms’s best, quite different from the slighter third movement.

The final movement, very taut, brought the evening’s concert to a thrilling conclusion, worthy of an encore, but sadly we clapped in vain.

• Bradford’s chamber concert season will close tomorrow with a concert at Bradford Cathedral by the Aronowitz Ensemble featuring music by Schubert, Faure and Dvorak.

The Aronowitz musicians have been described as a true ensemble, listening, responding and moving as one while creating melliflous, fascinating textures.

The Ensemble was formed by seven leading young international artists to using the highly-adaptable combination of string sextet and piano.

Since there sell-out debut in 2004, the group have maintained a busy schedule of engagements across the UK and beyond, covering a vast range of familiar, neglected and new music.

• Book for the concert by visiting bradford-theatres.co.uk or calling 01274 432000.

• John Pettitt