Sibelius Violin Concerto in Aberdeen by Mendelssohn, Tchaikovsky, P. I., Glinka, Sibelius, From (2016/2016), Conductor Ben Gernon, His Majesty's Theatre, Aberdeen, United Kingdom

Blink and you miss it: few overtures hurtle upwards and explode quite as brilliantly as Glinka’s Ruslan and Ludmilla. But then, in the long winter nights of Northern Europe musicians have always known how to light up the sky. Sibelius’s Violin Concerto sounds like it’s lit by the midnight sun, and according to the critics, the rising French star Alexandra Soumm makes it glow with a special intensity. And Tchaikovsky’s Fourth Symphony begins in an inferno of personal tragedy before cracking out the vodka and dancing till daybreak. Conductor Ben Gernon has a special flair for Tchaikovsky: on an autumn afternoon in Aberdeen, this should generate some serious heat.