{TABLE} Sleeping Beauty (excs)........................Tchaikovsky Spartacus Suites (excs).......................Khachaturian Romeo and Juliet (excs).......................Prokofiev Raymonda Suite (excs).........................Glazunov {/TABLE} THIS year's Teatime Summer Sounds" orchestral concerts at the National Concert Hall got off to a good start yesterday evening. Alexander Anissimov conducted the National Symphony Orchestra in a programme of Russian ballet music which was bravely ordered to end in virtually unknown territory - Glazunov's Raymonda. The concert was by no means flawless; but the playing was so vividly coloured, and 50 certain of purpose, that momentary slips did not seem to matter.
As with most concerts I have heard from Anissimov and the NSO, the playing had exceptional rhythmic focus - a sense of direction which was unerring, whatever the tempo and however flexible or sectional the music. He inspires confidence in the players, who can then take risks which have purely musical aims. In the "Panorama" from Tchaikovsky's Sleeping Beauty, for example, his very slow, one-in-a-bar beat barely moved, and the hushed playing opened up a vista as vivid in the imagination as on the stage.
Anissimov's pacing was a reminder that this music was conceived for dancing, not for orchestral display. The NSO was with him all the way in timing contrasted sections in "The Montagues and the Capulets" music from Prokofiev's Romeo and Juliet, for example - and in his very Russian way of holding back to anticipate what's around the corner. Again, this is all about rhythm and purpose, and it raised blistering intensity in parts of Khachaturian's Spartacus, especially in the famous (Onedin Line) "Adagio of Spartacus and Phrygia".
Glazunov's music is not in the same league as Tchaikovsky's or Prokofiev's, but the persuasive playing made it a rewarding end to an uplifting concert.