The Royal Philharmonic Orchestra with Vasily Petrenko and Pavel Kolesnikov

We’ve a dream team for this welcome return visit to Nottingham from the Royal Philharmonic Orchestra. Always a popular visitor, Vasily Petrenko has been doing great things with the orchestra since he became its Music Director in 2021 and his performances of Russian repertoire have become a benchmark within the classical world. He’s joined by the eloquent Siberian pianist, Pavel Kolesnikov, for Tchaikovsky’s First Piano Concerto, whose epic opening sets the scene for a titanic contest between soloist and orchestra.

Rachmaninoff's Second Symphony was a major personal achievement given the mauling his first had received, but he was in a very positive mood when he wrote it, with a settled home life and space to think whilst on a retreat in Dresden. The longest of his symphonic works, it has drama and passion to match its epic span. At its heart is one of the most rapt slow movements ever heard, so beautiful that it even found its way into a hit song by 1970s pop star, Eric Carmen. But any excessive sentiment is banished by a wildly inventive scherzo and the exhilarating, headlong rush of the finale.

Free pre-concert talk, 6.20pm in the auditorium: Dr Sophie Redfern introduces the programme.