Powerfully Involving

Did Mahler pioneer the concept of the concerto for orchestra? He may not have actually used that title, but listening to BBC Philharmonic Orchestra's performance of the Fifth Symphony with conductor Juanjo Mena had me wondering (Royal Concert Hall, Nottingham, UK, 28 April 2012). There was a genuine sense of interaction, particularly in those passages where Mahler's scoring has a chamber-orchestra-like transparency -- no wonder there were so many calls for individual players to receive applause at the end...