It is, composer Max Lambert admits, quite a while since he’s sat down at the piano and played Chopin in anger.

“I still play every day but usually it’s workhorse stuff,” Lambert tells Limelight. “But back when I was about 20 and studying at the Sydney Conservatorium of Music, I used to drive my family crazy playing it. Now I’m having to get back up to speed.”

Best known for his musical theatre scoring (Darlinghurst Nights and Miracle City) and his music direction of the Opening and Closing ceremonies of the 2000 Sydney Olympics, Lambert says that going back to the classics “has been a bit of a shock”.

“Hopefully, what I’ve lost in technique I’ve made up for in maturity and experience,” he says. “When you get to my age you want to be saying something when you play. When you’re a music student aged 20, you’re just showing off.”

Lambert is revisiting Chopin – and the music of other classical composers – for the score of a new play, TIM, an adaptation of Colleen McCullough’s 1974 novel about a May-September romance between 50-something businesswoman Mary, and Tim, a labourer with a mild intellectual disability who’s half her...