Howard Williams conducted an all-British programme with the Hungarian Radio Symphony Orchestra at MUPA Budapest, Hungary in January.
Ahead of the concert, he was interviewed by Ur Máté for Papageno.hu, who asked him about the programme and the history of working with the Orchestra
“I have now been working with the Radio Symphony Orchestra since the early 1990s when we recorded together the music of Sándor Balassa for Hungaroton. Since then, the working atmosphere in Hungarian orchestras – as throughout Europe – has changed a great deal. In Hungary especially, I find the sense of creative collaboration is much more evident, in a way which perhaps reflects society as a whole. This is a great advantage in our current project, in which we have to prepare a programme ranging across so many different styles. For this, we require an intimate, historically informed style for the Purcell Ode and a keenly alert response to the ‘modernism’ of Walton in his Cello Concerto. The Radio Symphony Orchestra is superb in reproducing this range of styles.”
Read the full interview here:
papageno.hu/english/interviews/2026/01/royal-masterworks-an-interview-with-howard-williams
📸 – Magyar Rádió Művészeti Együttesei