Far from the masked crowd Stu Hunter created some very beautiful things at the piano for us during this event. This was a strong and welcome return to SydFest after his last appearance in 2016.
The structure was a series of keyboard moments which grew from a contrasted selection of clear themes which yielded much in the ensuing entertaining minutes.
This event’s cast was a substantially unassuming one at the piano. Hunter was swathed in subtle then progressively dazzling lighting effects and positions of the overhead chameleon bulbs.
He delivered musical elaborations in this piano concert which defied the visual blandness of the usual solo keyboard stage arrangement in a sequence of utterances which spoke in a myriad of brilliant, warm unpretentious voices.
The genius of Stu Hunter’s pianism and musicality showed itself his gentle pacing and smooth transitions within each exploration from the understated, slow and beautiful intoning intros to more hectic movement including scintillating passage work.
He just as smoothly brought the busyness back down again and guided us through gestures and colours as varied as the inspiring warmth of the light show we and the piano and York Theatre stage were flooded in.
Only at a fresh-but masked-face SydFest 2021 event could we experience such compact and progressive entertainment at a time when the need to relax and feel safe are constantly paramount.
In alignment with the goals of this festival always and keenly this year, the expressive local artist on stage helped us push artistic and in this case sonic boundaries.
The useless, outdated binary division of genre between classical and non classical piano styles was nicely blurred and at times obliterated.
Mozart, Ravel, Beethoven and other composers across history would have revelled in the chance to use the piano and concert stage in such an unconventionally beautiful way to develop the ebb and flow of drama during an hour of subsequent free-form movements.
Trance and other assorted jazz players would likewise enjoy the chance to cross boundaries. In turn they could display their sheer technique in similar journeys across pianistic and musical style, earn the envy of the most earnest classically trained keyboard players.
Stu Hunter traversed such boundaries showing virtuosic independence of the hands, a tasteful spontaneity in touching us and all registers of his instrument with his refined, unique approach to nuance.
The audience exclamations along this slick and nicely produced journey and final ovation were truly well deserved. A recording for even safer listening from home would be another beautiful thing.
Images of Stu Hunter by Yaya Stempler.