Bath Symphony Orchestra excelled itself with an evening of humour, brilliance, romance and high drama.

As the packed audience at the Wiltshire Music Centre dispersed into the summer rain on Friday night there was a palpable sense of pleasure and excitement.

The evening started, not with the familiar seriousness of Brahms, but with his sunny and irreverent Academic Festival Overture.

Here the orchestra sparkled in an energetic and rousing performance showing off all sections to their best. This was a rollicking performance, and well introduced by playing in advance the four drinking songs on which the work is based, and which some in the audience may have forgotten from their youth.

So many superlatives come to mind to describe the playing of Costos Fotopoulos in the third Rachmaninov piano concerto: the effect was simply stunning.

According to the Guiness Book of Records Rachmaninov's hands could stretch 13 notes on the piano and he had an extraordinarily long thumb. Costos Fotopoulos had no such advantages yet he played with an ease that made this most difficult of concertos appear improvised. The colossal chords, the wonderfully haunting lyricism and the sparkling eloquence of the piano was matched by an impressive performance from the orchestra. The orchestra played with energy and conviction, though at times the piano did not come clearly enough through the orchestral sound.

The evening concluded with the Borodin second symphony where the orchestra captured well the high drama and driving rhythm of the first movement. Woodwind and brass gave a spirited performance in the scherzo, imitating the gusts of laughter intended by Borodin, followed by a beautifully played slow movement where the singing of a bard was evoked by clarinet, horn and harp.

Robert Bailey