Ashkenazy and Ohlsson’s Emperor strikes in back-to-back Beethoven.

As part of a series of six all-Beethoven concerts this year, their former Chief Conductor, Vladimir Ashkenazy, makes a welcome return to the Sydney Symphony Orchestra. This latest concert, entitled Beethoven Triumphant involved an element of wistfulness for this reviewer, as Ashkenazy’s was the first version I ever heard of the Piano Concerto No 5 (Emperor). It almost felt like Ashkenazy – one of the greatest pianists of the 20th century – could have directed the first half from the piano, though the internationally acclaimed Garrick Ohlsson’s rendition was quite superb.

It is always curious when epithets such as Emperor are applied to musical numbers. As Toscanini said of the Eroica symphony, “To some it is Napoleon, to some it is philosophical struggle; to me it is Allegro con brio.” The great Viennese music critic Eduard Hanslick was equally scathing of programmatic titles and interpretations of “absolute music”. Beethoven himself was unaware that this moniker would be used for his concerto, though all the imperial elements are there: the E Flat Major key; the rippling arpeggios with which the piano opens the work; and the heavy string passages that define the exposition of the first and third...