The Orchestra of the Age of Enlightenment make you listen again to Haydn.
Under Sir Roger Norrington they put an energy and pace into an all-Haydn evening at the Usher Hall on Saturday (22 August) that shook any dust off the audience's conception of the 18th century composer.
The Symphony No 49 had drive and colour from this orchestra playing period instruments and David Blackadder used an "organised trumpet" of the kind invented in the late 1770s to expand the instrument's range of notes and give flair to the Trumpet Concerto in E flat.
An electrical failure after the interval plunged the orchestra and American mezzo-soprano Joyce DiDonato into gloom half way through the mad scene aria of Scena di Berenice. After a couple of false starts Usher Hall staff gave up on the misbehaving rack of overhead spotlights and turned on every other available light in the hall to allow the performance to continue.
Miss DiDonato was undaunted. She threw herself into completing the tragic aria with passionate despair and earned near-rapturous approval from the house.
Playing Haydn's Symphony No 48 might have been subdued by the slightly ochre lighting but the brace of French horns were having none of it and made this the showcase symphony that the composer intended.
Time: 22 Aug Only, 8pm