★★★★★ Zukerman and co give a faultless recital of top-notch chamber music.

Sydney Opera House, Utzon Room
August 16, 2015

It is customary to award five stars for a faultless musical recital, but I wonder whether the rules could be bent in the case of the Zukerman Trio in the latest of the Utzon series at Sydney Opera House.

For if any 90 minutes of top-notch chamber music deserved six stars this must have been it.

With Canadian-based Israeli maestro Pinchus Zukerman’s matchless musicianship and charisma at its core, this is a trio made in heaven. His South African-born wife Amanda Forsyth brings passion and formidable technique as a cellist, and Canadian pianist Angela Cheng is the dream accompanist who lives every note.

Their programme opened with Dvořák’s Four Romantic pieces for violin and piano, and although these pieces were composed for amateurs rather than virtuosi, they have bags of charm.

The simple double stopping of the yearning larghetto which closes the set showed Zukerman’s delicate control of the bow, as well as his precise intonation.

A change of programme introduced Forsyth to the intimate audience of 200. She and Angela Cheng were originally down to play Schumann’s Three Romances but substituted those for...