Erin Wall did the CBSO a huge favour nearly two years ago when she stepped in as the last-minute replacement as soprano soloist in the  50th anniversary performance of Britten's War Requiem at its birthplace, Coventry Cathedral.

She returned in her own right this week in markedly different repertoire, the autumnal introspection of the Four Last Songs by Richard Strauss, and what a wonderful, engaging reading she gave us. Body-language was initially a little fulsome, but that soon faded in the face of such even-timbred delivery, Wall deeply involved in every word of Hesse's poetry.

And the CBSO under Andris Nelsons responded wholeheartedly and movingly. Tuttis were sumptuous and well-weighted, and instrumental solos touched the heart; Elspeth Dutch's horn-playing really hit the spot, but I know she won't mind giving place to the solos of prince among concertmasters Laurence Jackson, his violin trembling on the edge of the other-world.

Nelsons had begun with some Richard Strauss right at the opposite end of the composer's life, when he was a rising young buck taking the world by storm: the tone-poem Don Juan, whose coruscating opening notes were the first Nelsons ever conducted with the CBSO, and which launched such an ineffable relationship between them.

Double-basses were here ranged across the back, having swapped places with the percussion, and the twang of their pizzicatos was arresting. At the other end of the dynamic scale, the various interludes were gloriously dreamy, and throughout Nelsons' gestures inspired not only his players, but also us in the audience, drawing our attention to relevant lines. We are going to miss him, and in a way are doing so already.

We concluded with a generous compendium of numbers from Prokofiev's ballet Romeo and Juliet, alert, zippy, and once again displaying the amazing strength in depth in every department of this orchestra which is currently playing out of socks which must be at least ten feet long.