LPO, Jurowski, Royal Festival Hall

Searing Prokofiev scores over his worthy but turgid composer-friend Myaskovsky

For many of us, this was bound to be an emotional evening. Noëlle Mann, doyenne of all things Prokofievian on the editorial, archival, teaching and performing fronts, died peacefully at home last Friday, and it was to her that Vladimir Jurowski dedicated a typically bold programme of Prokofiev's late epic for cello and orchestra, the Symphony-Concerto, and a big but rather less focused symphony by his closest composer-friend Nikolay Myaskovsky. Perhaps it's presumptuous to speak for the departed; but I could hear Noëlle responding vitally to her master's voice, applauding Jurowski for championing the lesser-known figure but sternly proclaiming the verdict shared by most of us: that while Prokofiev was touched by the divine spirit, poor, diligent Myaskovsky clearly wasn't.

Varèse 360°, Southbank

20th-century hellraiser still delivering the goods

For those of you who think that classical music ends with Mahler - or Brahms just to be on the safe side - that the musical experimentation of the past 60 years was some sort of grim continental joke, an extended whoopee cushion of a musical period that seemed to elevate the garden-shed accident into some kind of art form, you have two people to blame: Adolf Hitler and Edgar Varèse.

Les Aventures Extraordinaires d'Adèle Blanc-Sec

Pterodactyls and Egyptian mummies on the loose in Paris, circa 1912

BD, pronounced bédé, is short for "bande déssinée", the French equivalent of the comic-strip or graphic novel, which has long been accorded a popular affection and cultural standing well beyond that of its anglophone equivalent. Luc Besson says he was weaned on BD, which comes as no surprise to anyone familiar with his films. The only surprise is that it has taken him so long to direct an adaptation of one.