LPO/Vänskä

In any normal month at the ­Southbank Centre, the world's greatest ­Sibelius ­interpreter conducting the music that he has done more than any other ­living ­musician to promote would be the standout event. Here, though, Osmo Vänskä's cycle with the ­London ­Philharmonic has to ­jostle with ­Barenboim's residency and the Takács Quartet's Beethoven, and ­perhaps is ­getting less attention than it deserves. The four concerts are planned more or less chronologically, so Sibelius's ­symphonic journey, one of the most remarkable ever undertaken by a ­composer, should unfold naturally. The second instalment included the second and third symphonies, separated by a group of seven orchestral songs to Swedish texts sung persuasively enough by soprano Helena Juntunen, though only three of the songs were ­orchestrated by Sibelius ­himself. With the LPO playing their hearts out for ­Vänskä, just a few moments of the ­opening of the Third Symphony were enough to underline how special his approach is: ­textures are bright and ­incisive, detail charged with energy and dramatic potential. The sense of organic growth right through the Third was inexorable, too, and Vänskä understands ­better than anyone how to manage ­Sibelius's favourite transitions between ­movements of different speeds – from the scherzo to the finale in the Third, for instance, or from the troubled ­interlude that leads into the ­radiant finale of the Second. The slow ­movement of the ­Second, which was first sketched for a tone poem and sometimes seems to belong there more than in a ­symphony, had a ­powerful, almost operatic ­intensity, which ­Vänskä revealed as the symphony's true ­emotional heart. More such revelations, no doubt, are still to come.