The OSO’s season ended on Saturday with a pair of composers that, at first sight, appeared to have little to do with each other: the great Romantic composer Richard Strauss and his near-contemporary, the little-known Hungarian Miklós Rózsa. What linked them — perhaps a little tenuously — was the concert’s theme of ‘movie music’.

Rózsa worked extensively for MGM during the post-war years, in between composing for the concert hall, and his momentous Violin Concerto, which opened the concert, was written for concert performance but later adapted for the 1970 film The Private Life of Sherlock Holmes. Richard Strauss, of course, wrote primarily for the stage and concert hall, but his magnificent tone poem, An Alpine Symphony, was described by early critics as ‘cinema music’ owing to its exceptionally vivid depiction of an alpine mountain climb.

Former BBC Young Musician of the Year Jennifer Pike gave a dazzling account of the Violin Concerto, negotiating some extraordinarily difficult technical passages with virtuosic brilliance, and imbuing the work with passion, intensity and exceptional musicianship. The tonal quality throughout was sublime, and she clearly had a great rapport with the orchestra; there were some wonderfully fluent exchanges between soloist and orchestra, the two interweaving effortlessly throughout, particularly in the exuberant finale. This was a simply stunning performance — which seemed all the more so when I discovered that Ms Pike is only 21.

After the interval came Strauss’s epic tone poem, which describes the adventures of a group of climbers as they ascend an alpine mountain. This was an energetic and meticulous performance, with conductor Robert Max ensuring some fine contrasts between the constantly shifting moods, from the lyrical representation of waterfalls, bird song and grazing cattle, to the determined striding of the climbers and the ferociousness of the thunderstorm. The piece ended as it began, with night falling on the mountain, bringing the evening to a sublime and profound finish.