Elisabeth Murdoch Hall was full and the pre-concert chat more animated than usual for the launch of Jayson Gillham’s national tour with his good friend, the Palestinian-Jordanian pianist Iyad Sughayer. This was Sughayer’s Australian concert debut.

They titled their program Keys to Life to affirm music’s connective power, and subtitled it “Two Friends, Two Pianos” to underline the role their friendship plays in their music-making.

When they took the stage, they were greeted with thunderous applause.

Keys to Life: Iyad Sughayer and Jayson Gillham. Photo © Fred Kroh

For the first item, Debussy’s Petite Suite, the duo shared a keyboard. Together they drew out the colours in these four finely crafted miniatures. Sughayer (playing the upper part) seemed to stroke colours from the keys, while Gillham brought images of rippling water and graceful pirouettes to life with brilliantly executed filigree passages.

Mozart’s Sonata in D major called for two pianos. The two concert grands were wedged together, with one lid arching over them. Gillham and Sughayer sat facing each other at opposite ends of the piano hub, relying on nods and empathy to stay aligned. Their unaffected smiles, supportive nods and mutual engagement warmed their performance and strengthened their connection with the audience.

The first half ended with Ravel’s Introduction and Allegro – another spirited, joyous work that Gillham and Sughayer performed with panache. 

Keys to Life: Iyad Sughayer and Jayson Gillham. Photo © Fred Kroh

After the interval, the duo swapped parts and pianos. Sughayer took particular pleasure in introducing Khachaturian’s only work for two pianos, Three Pieces for Two Pianos, having already recorded all the composer’s solo piano works.

Then followed the world premiere of Isolated by Levantine-Lebanese composer Houtaf Khoury. Khoury’s music conveyed a sense of latency. Soft harmonies, rumblings and fluid sounds folded into one another, expanding and contracting until finally the music subsided into silence. 

The final two works were both colourful Romantic salon pieces. Russian composer Anton Arensky’s Suite No. 1 for Two Pianos (he wrote four) was filled with tender melodies, graceful dances and bravura.

The same ingredients – spiced with Spanish flavours – appeared in the Spanish rhapsody España by the French composer Emmanuel Chabrier. It ended jubilantly, and the hall erupted. Everyone who could stand did so.

Keys to Life: Iyad Sughayer and Jayson Gillham. Photo © Fred Kroh

After some heartfelt thank-yous, Gillham and Sughayer returned to the piano to play The Fairy Garden from Ravel’s Mother Goose Suite. Sitting together, their hands rising and falling balletically, they looked and sounded like one.

Their joy was infectious, and the whole hall felt it. Gillham and Sughayer could not have received a warmer reception.

Jayson Gillham & Iyad Sughayer perform Keys to Life at Queensland Performing Arts Centre, Brisbane, 22 July; Elder Hall, Adelaide, 24 July and City Recital Hall, Sydney, 26 July.