Classical Music Review: The Hallé with Kahchun Wong at the Royal Concert Hall

On 30 April 2006, I saw Bernard Haitink conduct the LSO in a performance of Beethoven’s First and Ninth Symphonies at the Barbican. At that stage in my concert going, I considered it the single greatest live music event I’d attended (it still ranks in the top five). The applause was sustained, the audience rising to their feet as one. I knew immediately that I’d witnessed lightning captured in a bottle; that this was something incredibly special and that very few other concerts would come close. I decided there and then that I would forego live performances of the Ninth: I’d only be opening the door to disappointment.

My resolve held for nineteen years.

On 3 June 2025, I saw The Hallé under their new principle conductor Kahchun Wong perform Wagner’s Tannhauser overture and Beethoven’s Ninth at Nottingham’s Royal Concert Hall. It was every bit as dynamic, exciting and transcendental. The applause was sustained. The audience rose in a standing ovation.

For the benefit of anyone reading this review who knows me and knows what Bernard Haitink means to me as man, humanitarian and musician - and who may be gaping at the LeftLion website in slack-jawed amazement - let me just repeat that statement: I saw a performance of the Ninth in Nottingham that equalled the world-class achievement of Bernard Haitink and the London Symphony Orchestra at London’s premiere classical music venue.

I will admit that I edged into the Royal Concert Hall with a degree of trepidation. I had little knowledge of Kahchun Wong beyond the enviable degree of enthusiastic buzz that his appointment generated. I wondered, no matter how talented an incoming conductor, how difficult it would be to fill the shoes vacated by Sir Mark Elder, his twenty-five year association with The Hallé cementing him into the orchestra’s cultural and artistic history as definitively as Sir John Barbirolli.

Granted, during the Wagner - notwithstanding that it was delivered with authority, attention to detail and an incredible sense of musical intuition - I did wonder if Wong was given to showboating. But the more keenly I watched him, the more the rapport between maestro and orchestra became apparent. The sheer sustained brilliance of the music-making was undeniable. The palpable joy of the players was infectious. They - and Wong - were living their best lives, widescreen and in technicolour. What I had taken for playing-to-the-gallery flamboyance was, I soon realised, Kahchun Wong’s default setting. The man has charisma, confidence and musical talent to burn. He hasn’t just filled Elder’s boots; he is already beginning to write the next chapter of The Hallé’s history.

If the Wagner was outstanding, the Beethoven took a quantum leap. This was orchestral playing as direct communication with the composer and immediate transmission of every note, nuance and emotion to the audience. Conducting without a score, Wong’s attention to detail while never losing sight of the overarching aesthetic of each movement, was unparalleled. The Hallé Choir delivered the Ode to Joy finale (the text is from Schiller’s great poem of unification and brotherhood) as if they’d been given an exclusive glimpse of the gates of paradise standing open.

None of this is hyperbole. Nottingham really was gifted with a concert for the ages, a huge and game-changing symphony interpreted passionately, urgently and faultlessly by a rising talent who has come into his own. Bravo, maestro. Bravo, Hallé. This season - indeed, any season - of Nottingham Classics could not have concluded in finer style.

The Hallé played at the Royal Concert Hall on Tuesday 3 Jun 2025, 7.30PM.