Evidently it is much easier to improve the sound in the Barbican Hall than it is the interval coffee, which remains indifferent, while the refurbished auditorium is a revelation. It comes as a real shock to go to a concert in London and find that the sound is being positively projected towards the back of the stalls, rather than the audience being expected to search for it. Orchestras that play at the Barbican from now on will have to adjust their performances accordingly.
Even the London Symphony Orchestra is, to some extent, still coming to terms with its new home. Thursday's concert, the second instalment of its Elgar cycle with chief conductor Colin Davis, was the orchestra's third appearance there since the hall reopened last weekend, and the sound picture was not always completely unified. Brass, horns and lower woodwind sometimes seemed overemphasised, perhaps because before the improvements those sections had to work extra hard to make their contributions tell. But the new sense of immediacy and detail is compelling, the physicality of the sound genuinely exciting. The delicate woodwind tracery around the soloist in so much of Mozart's E flat Piano Concerto K482 wouldn't have registered as eloquently and easily in the old Barbican, for instance.
Mitsuko Uchida's solo playing in the concerto was nervily energised in the first movement, suave and delicately coloured in the slow movement; she invested the stately minuet episode in the final rondo with extra gravitas. She was carefully and sympathetically attended by Davis, who provided perfectly gauged support without ever overshadowing his soloist, whose performance, complete with her own cadenzas, was exemplary.
When a full symphony orchestra is involved, the potential dynamic range of the hall seems bigger than ever, and the sound appears to grow effortlessly. Davis conceived Elgar's Second Symphony on a massive scale, full of teeming detail and sudden, stark transitions. The confident, aspiring opening had a real surging intensity; it gave way to gently moulded episodes that were given the space to breathe, but never lost a sense of momentum. Davis's ability to highlight passing moments while keeping sight of the long-term goals of the symphony was exceptional, and the way in which he moved the work to its radiant close, with the most delicate recollection of the first, "spirit of delight" theme, was beautifully done.
