A program of warhorses that comes off thanks to a thoroughly thoroughbred performance.

Conservatorium Theatre

Southbank, Brisbane

March 9, 2014

Not for the faint-hearted, Jayson Gillham set himself a formidable challenge when he chose such evergreens and war horses by Beethoven, Scriabin, Chopin and Liszt for his debut recital with the Medici Concerts, International Piano Masterworks Series last Sunday. It was a program ironically that could well have been chosen by Piers Lane another Queenslander and London-based pianist featured in the series.

Brisbane audiences have followed the career of 27-year-old Gillham with great interest ever since the fresh-faced country boy from Dalby surprised Queensland’s classical music scene with his fierce and precocious talent some ten years ago. In 2013 he performed Beethoven’s Emperor Concerto with the Queensland Symphony Orchestra, a concerto he presented as finalist in the UK’s Leeds Piano Competition.

Medici Concerts has featured a line-up of the world’s finest wizards of the keys including Paul Lewis, Freddy Kempf, Stephen Hough, Pascal Rogé and Barry Douglas. And the audience of predominantly piano cognoscenti, students, teachers, professors and classical music buffs is a demanding, discerning crowd. At interval, there’s a caffeine-fuelled buzz in the crowded foyer as the strengths and frailties of the...