JESPER Svedberg is a remarkable performer to watch.

Perched in front of the revered Bournemouth Symphony Orchestra ranks, the Swedish cellist gurned, arched, contorted and grinned his way through Don Quixote, Strauss’s emotive and complex ten-variation work, embodying the tense anticipation and giddy glee of the piece as he went.

Windmills are mistaken for angry giants, flocks of sheep are confused with armies and monks are transformed into wizards in Strauss’s narrative, and Svedberg’s own sense of wonderment and drama made it a fantastical journey to believe in.

Not to be outdone, Rimsky- Korsakov’s Scheherazade imagines a wife who saved herself from a fated death at the hands of her Sultan husband by regaling him with tall stories for 1,001 nights.

Her enviable imaginings of shipwrecks and kaleidoscopic festivals veered from all-out pomp to meditative tranquillity via rich melodies, harp intonations and subtle percussive shimmering.

Principal conductor Kirill Karabits had to be at his forceful best to ramp up the fanfare, storming back on for a glorious finale which brought the crowd to its feet and the turbulent epic to a triumphant end.