Dubbed Australia’s ‘Godfather of Piano’, Piers Lane has performed for audiences and royalty around the globe. The master pianist performs here in Canberra at the new Snow Concert Hall on 29 June. CW caught up with Mr Lane to discuss music, favourite pieces, and the future.

1. Tell us about the upcoming concert at Snow Concert Hall.

I’ve heard wonderful things about the Snow Concert Hall, including its acoustics, and I’m hugely looking forward to seeing it and playing there.

I feel honoured to be among its first performers. As it is the 150th anniversary of Sergei Rachmaninov’s birth this year, I have devised a program based on his music and that of Chopin, surely the most universally loved composer for the piano.

2. When did you know that you wanted to play the piano?

My parents were both pianists, though teachers rather than concert pianists. My mother was from Innisfail in Far North Queensland and met my English father when they were auditioning to be students of the Royal College of Music in London.

I guess piano music was one of the first sounds I ever heard, and I simply assumed during boyhood in Brisbane that I’d be a pianist when I grew up. Little did I know what that would entail, but the piano has been the light guiding my life. Where it has led, I have followed.

3. Do you have a favourite piece to play?

That’s always a tricky question – it depends on the day and the year and what one is performing at the time. Sometimes I’m in a Bach mood, sometimes Schubert, sometimes something more frivolous.

There’s a Chopin Nocturne I adore and which I often play as an encore – the one in Db. It just might turn up on Thursday!

4. Do you have any highlights of your career?

There have been all sorts of highlights in different ways.

Playing to a full Royal Albert Hall for The Proms on five occasions is certainly a highlight, and receiving a standing ovation in Carnegie Hall for a performance of the 75-minute-long Busoni Concerto was thrilling.

Equally, flying in a one-prop plane over endless tundra to play to Inuit kids who’d never heard classical music in Mekoryuk in Alaska, or drinking too much local rum and Coke with the audience after playing in Loja in Ecuador (which necessitates another hairy flight between mountain spurs) were highlights of a totally different kind.

5. What’s next for you?

I direct and chair the Jury of the Sydney International Piano Competition from July 5-22. Then I’m flying to New York to play the Vaughan Williams Double Concerto and other works in the Bard Music Festival.

Teaching and playing at the Chetham’s Summer Festival in Manchester and then judging the Clara Haskil International Piano Competition in Vevey, Switzerland. That finishes September 2nd and then I’m going to have a fortnight’s holiday in my own home.

Hear the renowned skills of Piers Lane at Snow Concert Hall, Canberra Grammar School, Thursday 29 June 7pm; snowconcerthall.com

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