Music / Simon Tedeschi  Plays Your Requests, Australian Centre for Christianity and Culture. September 18. Reviewed by DAVID WHITBREAD.

Starting with the boisterous theme from The Simpsons and ending with an equally boisterous ragtime-infused theme from Super Mario Brothers, Simon Tedeschi astounded his audience with a masterclass in the piano.

Well, that’s what you get when you ask your audience on arrival to nominate what they’d like to hear – and you build your program by randomly selecting from a box of their requests!

It takes a special performer to be so comfortable with the unpredictable – this is only the fifth or sixth time he’s done it – and a prodigious memory to then perform to the outstanding level of artistry we witnessed.

Just a word of disappointment with the audience, not the performer.

Given the hosts were the ACT Keyboard Association, the almost capacity audience was made up of many piano teachers and students.

So why were the requests so predictable? Short of the bookends, there were no surprises in the requested composers, also no women, no Australians … it read like the contents list of European master piano works from the Baroque to the Impressionists. Yep, the B composers Bach, Beethoven, Brahms, and Mozart, Chopin, Rachmaninoff, Debussy … With only one other – Gershwin, of course (more later).

The rules of the engagement are that, once played, a composer cannot be played again. Also that, while you can request a particular work, the pianist may play any work by that composer. He will also mostly deny requests for works written for piano and orchestra.

Tedeschi is an affable host, telling often funny stories prompted by the random selections and then performing immaculately. While always stylistically informed, he has a penchant for heightening the dramatic possibilities in any era. His interpretation is guaranteed to hold an audience in the palms of his hands.

Bach’s Great Fantasia (without Fugue) originally for organ showed how Bach foreshadowed what was to come – particularly in this realisation. It still retained the turns and trills, the counterpoint, but the shaping was exceptional.

A nine-year-old piano student requested Mozart’s Piano Concerto No. 19 that Simon had played at Sydney Opera House when he also was nine. It demonstrated the required crisp clarity of fingering and interpolated the dramatic orchestral dynamics.

Rhapsody in Blue by George Gershwin has become synonymous with Tedeschi. He first performed it with Tommy Tycho in 1993. It is his most performed and requested work.

Understandably – when you hear this mighty solo piano interpretation.

After the opening sections, it got into its rhythmic centre with Tedeschi channelling Gershwin in the wild speed and shifting harmonies, with a mighty crescendo leading to a sudden stillness prior to the big romantic theme. Enormous dynamic contrast and a great, inventive walking bass line led to a thrilling climax.

When Debussy came up, Simon chose his most famous piano work, Clair de lune. A contrast to so many works on the random program, this had an incredibly beautiful and peaceful opening, so delicately played with melting harmonies and ringing tones, particularly in the upper register.

Yep, by the end, I had teared up.

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