These two pianists, born in Taiwan, gained their master’s degrees at Victoria University, and have studied elsewhere. They have returned to Wellington with a host of awards and prizes in their brief-cases.  They have both become highly polished players who have recently joined forces to play piano duets, and duos, no doubt, which they do with a unanimity of feeling and technical mastery that is not usually acquired in... read more

A concert of piano duets (four hands on one piano) is likely to raise discussion about the propriety of arrangements and the voicing of opinions about the merits of an orchestral arrangement of a piece for piano four hands (or two hands, for that matter). As it happens, most of the music at this concert was originally written for four hands though two were later orchestrated for a ballet. The opening... read more

What was revealed in the leaflet advertising this highly enjoyable series at St Andrew’s hardly covered the reality. The names of neither of the two pianists were familiar, nor were two of the composers, though the name Guastavino might have rung bells. The two pianists have played together for several years, and are currently staff pianists at the University of Auckland School of Music.

However, Liszt’s Dante Sonata... read more