RPO/Petrenko review – dazzling Scriabin and spine-tingling Wagner

Royal Festival Hall, London
After a sombre opening, the ecstasies promised in the evening’s theme were reached with Wagner and Scriabin. The Royal Philharmonic and its new conductor are clearly enjoying themselves in this imaginative and accessible season

Now in his second season as its music director, Vasily Petrenko has brought a welcome touch of post-pandemic style and excitement to the Royal Philharmonic Orchestra, once the Cinderella of London orchestras. His thematic programming this year, subtitled Journeys of Discovery, is at once imaginative and accessible. Best of all, the RPO, who were in great form, seem to love playing for him.

Not all of the repertoire in the latest concert lived up to the evening’s prescribed theme of Ecstasy. There are certainly ecstatic moments in Prokofiev’s Romeo and Juliet, but you would hardly know that from the four largely doom-laden pieces Petrenko selected from the ballet to open the concert. Nevertheless the RPO played them with swagger, weight and swift-fingered finesse, allowing a succession of principals to shine.

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