German-French cellist Nicolas Altstaedt and Serbian pianist Aleksandar Madžar first performed together at the 2015 Musica Viva Festival in Sydeny, a Limelight review at the time describing the pairing as “a compelling partnership”. Musica Viva’s Artistic Director Carl Vine evidently agreed, having brought the two musicians back to Australia for their first recital tour as a duo.

And it was a programme to sink your teeth into. Altstaedt’s crisp, penetrating sound was arresting in the first movement of Debussy’s 1915 Cello Sonata – written during the composer’s final years as his health was failing him and World War I was raging – yet he brought a deftness of touch that lent his lines a graceful lyricism over the march of Madžar’s piano. The opening pizzicati of the Sérénade he gave a delightfully elastic walking-bass swagger. While this movement has been associated with the tragicomic Commedia dell’arte character Pierrot, in the hands of Altstaedt and Madžar it was all tragedy, crying slides from the cello dripping with pathos as the mood shifted between tender and sinister. The finale’s folk-like energy bristled with a gritty determination.

^Nicolas...