I am rapidly coming to the conclusion that every musical organisation needs Joanna MacGregor at its helm. She is a powerhouse. Since her arrival at BPO there has been aeons of new dynamism and different ways of working and – best of all – audiences are growing. The Dome was pretty full for this, the last concert of the season and there were, I was delighted to note, a number of attentive children in the mix.

And what a programme! I had written DNMTO (Do Not Miss This One) in large letters in my diary because it’s such pleasure to hear Beethoven’s Triple Concerto (C Major Op 56). The need for three soloists means that this beautiful piece doesn’t get as many outings as it deserves. I know it well from recordings but have heard it live only three or four times before – often by students.

This performance gave us MacGregor at the piano with Ruth Rogers, who usually leads BPO, on violin, and principal cellist Peter Adams – while the orchestra was led by Nicky Sweeney. The rapport was palpable with lots of happy smiles. Macgregor, Rogers and Sweeney were together at the BPO Ensemble concert last week and I shall never forget Adams’ beautiful work in the BPO’s recent St Matthew Passion.

With piano pointing into the heart of the orchestra. MacGregor directed from the keyboard – a sylishly elegant conductor. Like the violin concerto this work has a long, dramatic first movement followed by two shorter ones. The first movement was joyously well played. By the time you reach the second movement, it’s essentially chamber music and these players gave us an immaculately sensitive largo in the middle of the sandwich followed by perfect segue into the rondo – Beethoven at his most playful. I think the audience enjoyed it as much as the players did.

After the interval came a nippy bit of teamwork. With piano moved into its conventional concerto position and Rogers back in concert black in the leader’s seat it was time for MacGregor to treat us to a rousing performance of Beethoven’s Piano Concerto no 5 in E flat major, Op73, The Emperor. Again she directed from the keyboard with Rogers beating time with her bow very clearly to keep the orchestra together while MacGregor was playing. At one point in the middle movement Rogers unobtrusively rescued the orchestra when the ensemble slipped briefly out of synch. Otherwise this was one of the most focused accounts of this movement I’ve ever heard/seen with everyone watching everyone else almost continuously as MacGregor wove her Beethovenian lyrical magic into the texture. And when they got to what is, in my view, the best moment in classical/romantic music – the link passage into the rondo – it was delivered with touching poise rather than milled and I liked that. A word of praise too, for principal bassoon Jonathan Price whose fine work in the third movement shone though delightfully in a way that it often doesn’t.

And as it that weren’t enough the concert had opened with Barber’s Adagio for Strings. It’s popular, poignant and assocated on the public mind with many major tragic events such as the assassination of John F Kennedy and the 9/11 atrocities. This performance was clearly and incisively directed by Nicky Sweeney from the leader’s seat. It’s hard to make it sound fresh because it’s so familiar. Moreover it’s always harder to bring off an adagio than it is anything marked, for example, allegro. But here it was very cohesive, with fine dynamic control and as moving as it should be. I was especially impressed by the quality of bow control and the impact of the searing sequence of rising high notes in the middle.

Susan Elkin