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Christopher Halls

While the benefits of raising toddlers on Mozart are compelling, Dmitri Shostakovich’s music, particularly his Symphony No 11, should be avoided at all costs.
Given its highly “cinematic” depictions of war, pre-performance disclaimers such as “explicit musical content” or “listener discretion advised” would not go astray even for any uninitiated concertgoer.
Of its “brutal, horrific” nature, Hong Kong Philharmonic Orchestra’s music director designate Tarmo Peltokoski also addressed the 11th’s darkness at last year’s 2025/26 season launch in a video message.
A rendition of Dmitri Shostakovich’s Symphony No 11
Sticking to his guns, and the full orchestral artillery for that matter, Peltokoski and the HK Phil unleashed a rendition of The Year 1905 – subtitled for its depiction of events sparking the 1905 revolution in Russia – that was a thrilling, albeit disturbing, portrayal of war and its aftermath.
The 26-year-old Finn’s insistence on extracting maximum acerbic bite from the players was one thing, though often the starkly contrasted passages of looming terror and desolation before and after the acts of “intervention” were most impacting, leaving listeners with goosebumps and in a state of shell-shock.
Sounds resembling vulnerable pleas in the muted solos from Nitiphum Bamrungbanthum’s trumpet and Lin Jiang’s horn were spot on as they emerged from HK Phil’s uncomfortably still, icy opening in The Palace Square, a disturbing depiction of the descending crowds of petitioners on St Petersburg’s (Winter) Palace Square on the morning of Bloody Sunday.
James Boznos’ quiet and ominous timpani beats, a crucial part of this scene of looming trouble over an extended, static landscape, were poignant, and as Peltokoski built the orchestral busyness with foresight that well belies his years, the agitation turned gripping.

Climaxes, which receded again into states of frozen calm, were finely underscored by distant brass, and when the final orchestral build-up launched into a relentless pounding march, gunfire-like bursts from the snare drum, fiendish fugal string playing, and trombone and tuba glissandos producing near-nauseating sounds underneath, all made for a downright horrifying portrayal of the troops’ advance on the crowd, seeing Peltokoski leap and stomp on the podium here and there in the thick of it.
A moving and soulful reflection on the devastation followed in Memory Eternal, where violas comforted, albeit with a sense of uneasy warmth, presenting the song “You fell as a sacrifice”, which touched even more in its more tender repetition.
Equally sublime was the song “Bare your heads” from Kwan Sheung-fung’s cor anglais as it grew from The Palace Square stillness, but in the ensuing Tocsin (an alarm bell), Peltokoski steered the HK Phil into terror once again with a devastating Allegro finale that came as both a strong warning and a brave act of defiance.
In Shostakovich’s words, taken from Testimony, his memoirs edited by Solomon Volkov, “It’s about the people, who have stopped believing because the cup of evil has run over.”
Soloist Leila Josefowicz’s turn
Refreshingly, Friday’s concert began without the doom and gloom.
In Finnish conductor and composer-in-residence Esa-Pekka Salonen’s programme notes, he described Pulse II, the third movement of his Violin Concerto, as something “very Californian”.
The soloist, a force of nature herself and a passionate performer of contemporary works, was American-Canadian violinist Leila Josefowicz.
As the concerto’s dedicatee, and the fearless brand of soloist she is, Josefowicz pulled off Salonen’s “private narrative”, or his life in music, with aplomb.

If the centre of intonation was cloudy early on, Josefowicz soon gained momentum and basked in the playful virtuosity and open string resonances that mark the opening Mirage movement.
In Pulse I, a quasi dreamlike sequence yet in an awake state, Josefowicz, accompanied by timpani heartbeats, also impressed with crystalline harmonics that oscillated between sentiments of eeriness and innocence.
The sheer physicality required in Salonen’s “bizarre and urban” Pulse II saw the soloist right in her wheelhouse, pushing her instrument to its extremities and dishing up a veritable bevy of sound colour as she egged on Peltokoski and the orchestra to share her infectious rhythmic drive.
The finale, appropriately titled Adieu, was a curious blend of old and new sounds, where nostalgia was interspersed with forceful orchestral outbursts, and just as Josefowicz’s solo passagework heated up, her gritty “into-the-string” playing reminded one of Shostakovich’s passacaglia from his first violin concerto.
Much cheering and applause followed for the soloist, the orchestra and undoubtedly the concerto itself, to which Josefowicz, in close collaboration with Salonen, contributed in no small part.
Underscoring more of her whimsical virtuosity, the celebrated soloist then obliged with a turbulent chaconne encore (also by Salonen) titled Lachen Verlernt (Laughing Unlearnt), which was a pyrotechnical whirlwind and clearly right up Josefowicz’s alley.
“Tarmo Peltokoski Conducts Shostakovich 11”, Hong Kong Cultural Centre. Reviewed: April 24, 2026.


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Shostakovich’s Symphony No 11 was brought to life in ways that left listeners in a state of shell-shock


Shostakovich’s Symphony No 11 was brought to life in ways that left listeners in a state of shell-shock.


The Hong Kong Philharmonic Orchestra

Tarmo Peltokoski and Leila Josefowicz lead Hong Kong Philharmonic in thrilling concert

.css-1c6uqr6{color:inherit;font-weight:inherit;font-size:inherit;font-family:inherit;line-height:inherit;overflow-wrap:break-word;}Shostakovich’s Symphony No 11 was brought to life in ways that left listeners in a state of shell-shock

A rendition of Dmitri Shostakovich’s Symphony No 11

Shostakovich’s Symphony No 11 was brought to life in ways that left listeners in a state of shell-shock