An almost capacity audience at the Perth Concert Hall on Friday welcomed Johannes Fritzsch back to the West, his first visit since conducting Janáček’s Cunning Little Vixen for West Australian Opera in 2018.

The title ‘Miracle’ given to Haydn’s Symphony No 96 has been attributed to a chandelier falling from the ceiling of the concert hall during its London premiere in 1791, but apparently with no injuries inflicted on any member of the audience. Hence ‘The Miracle’. As one of the 12 ‘London’ symphonies composed by Haydn during his extended residence in the English capital, Symphony No 96 retains undoubted popular appeal, as indeed do all the London symphonies.

Francesco Lo Suro, Julia Brooke, Robert Gladstones, David Evans and the West Australian Symphony Orchestra, Miracles and Triumphs. Photo © Rebecca Mansell

The description ‘Father of the Symphony’ that has been bestowed on Haydn is not surprising given his development of the symphony, and the establishment of the pattern on which classical music would be based for more than a century. Humorous, tuneful and elegant, with balance and proportion paramount, these symphonies are regarded as being amongst his finest...