A Night at the Symphony was a concert of symphonic rock classics with the Sonderjylland Symphony Orchestra. Having been to similar events and really enjoyed them I was very excited to get tickets for the night. This is what I thought of the experience.

Ticketing System
Since this was meant to be a treat we opted for the highest-priced bracket tickets. For some reason the online booking system does not allow you to select your own seat within the price bracket you select. However, as ticket availability for this price bracket was showing as good we didn’t think this would be a problem. However, when we arrived at the hall we found out that our tickets were at the back and to the side (end of row, next to the wall).  I am really not sure how this classifies as top bracket tickets! One positive thing I can say is that there are discounts for people under 25, which comes in handy.

The Concert
As you might expect, finding our seats wasn’t the best start to the concert! Unfortunately, the rest of the concert also left much to be desired for me. The concert was perfectly enjoyable, but I wasn’t impressed.

The concert was advertised as a concert with the symphony orchestra. However, I felt that the orchestra definitely drew the short straw on this one. Rather than being allowed to shine, they were very much there in a support role; the spotlight was very clearly on the singers and the non-orchestral players (guitars, piano).

I was particularly disappointed in this as the conductor was described as someone who specialises in such events. In that situation I would have expected him to be a bit more adventurous and not rely as much on electric guitars. It was also surprising that the concert didn’t build up to a last song which saw you off home excited – the last song was one of the more middle-of-the-road ones from the evening’s selection.

These are, nevertheless, my views. The performers did get two encores from the rest of the audience. I guess I just need to go with lower expectations. As often happens, high expectations are rarely reached, while low ones are often surpassed.

In Hindsight
First of all, I would definitely recommend going down to the hall to book your tickets personally. Like that you can make sure you are really getting the seats that you think you are.

As for the concert itself, I definitely want to give the symphony orchestra another chance. The orchestral players obviously have the capability to make brilliant music, as could be seen from their rendition of ‘In the Hall of the Mountain King‘ from Peer Gynt (Edvard Grieg). When they were allowed to shine, they were brilliant!