Proms 2013: Warsaw Philharmonic at the Royal Albert Hall The final lap of the Proms traditionally brings out the great visiting orchestras, and no guests are more significant this season than the Warsaw Philharmonic. Others have been regular visitors for years, but in its belated Proms debut this 112-year-old orchestra demonstrated that it belongs among the top-ranking central European bands for the sheer quality of its sound - while its Albert Hall programme outclassed most of the others in its seriousness. Balancing two of Poland's leading 20th-century composers, Lutoslawski and Panufnik, with Shostakovich in both halves of the programme, the concert opened naturally enough with Lutoslawski's Concerto for Orchestra. A calling-card for the orchestra almost since it gave the premiere in 1954, this is also the work in which the Warsaw Philharmonic's outgoing artistic director, Antoni Wit, first conducted the orchestra 45 years ago and it clearly belonged in their final concert together. As Lutoslawski's most famous work, the Concerto for Orchestra has achieved the status of a modern classic, yet it doesn't always sound as deeply cultivated as here. These interpreters instinctively recognise its folk-melodic roots while also grasping its innovative structure, and the darkly-focused winds lent special pungency to the performance. The music of Andrzej Panufnik has suffered unjust neglect since his death in 1991, and perhaps next year's centenary will help to address this. Both works played here were being heard for the first time at the Proms - even his Tragic Overture, the reconstruction of a lost wartime work, finally revised the year after he defected to England in 1954. A musical protest against Poland's Nazi occupiers, it still packs an ominous punch. The quiet heart - and highlight - of the programme was Panufnik's Lullaby, a remarkable landmark in Polish music for its division of the string orchestra into 29 parts and use of clusters and quarter-tones. Wit shaped a beautiful performance that emerged softly from the dreamy, disembodied textures, and the orchestra's leader, Ewa Marczyk, spun wonderfully delicate lines. Shostakovich's Second Piano Concerto featured the soloist Alexander Melnikov, a player whose astonishing thoughtfulness and subtlety came through in the haunting slow movement. But overall this work is not about subtlety, and a little more brittle excitement would have helped. Wit's interpretative powers - he conducted everything except the concerto from memory - were best of all illustrated in his searing account of Shostakovich's Sixth Symphony, much more profound than the switched-on angst usually offered in London performances of this music.