The Waikanae Music Society’s next concert on Sunday 29 August features the internationally renowned pianist Piers Lane, giving his only solo recital while in New Zealand.
Waikanae Music Society concert manager Wendy van Delden explains that Piers Lane will be touring the main cities in September with an English string quartet. “We are extremely grateful to Chamber Music New Zealand for allowing us to bring Piers to New Zealand a few days earlier to give us this very special solo concert and we feel very proud that Waikanae will be the only centre in the country to have such a privilege.”
Piers Lane was born in England, brought up in Australia and in 1977 was the winner of the first Sydney International Piano Competition. Since then he has forged an international career, based in London, from where he has a busy schedule of concerts around the world. He has been soloist with many of the world’s major orchestras and appears at festivals in the US, UK and Europe as well as making regular return visits to Australia where he is musical director of the Townsville Chamber Music Festival. He has been soloist five times at the BBC Proms and has made numerous recordings. A recent review in Gramophone magazine said “no praise could be high enough for Piers Lane whose playing throughout is of a superb musical intelligence, sensitivity, and scintillating brilliance”.
The programme for his Waikanae concert is a piano lover’s dream, opening with a bracket of charming miniature German dances and waltzes by Schubert. This will be followed by four of Brahms’ last piano pieces (Opus 119) and one of Beethoven’s greatest Sonatas (Opus 110).
The second half of the programme is devoted to the music of Chopin, with the first Ballade and four Nocturnes. The concert will end with Schulz-Evler’s Arabesques on the Blue Danube, described as “a delightful confection a typical encore showpiece with a zillion notes”.
The concert, in the Waikanae Memorial Hall, starts at 2.30pm. Bookings are recommended, with tickets available from Waikanae New World, Moby Dickens Books in Paraparaumu Beach and Bookstacks in Raumati. Enquiries are welcome on 905 6070 or visit www.waikanaemusic.org