Kirill Gerstein

Book online and join us for the Season

The Art of the Impossible 

Discover the art of the impossible when Kirill Gerstein, poet of the piano, scales new heights of virtuosity. From delicate nocturnes to bravura polonaises to new work from Australian composer Liza Lim, this philosopher showman takes us from much-loved landscapes to mysterious worlds where few dare to go. 

2024 Concert Season

Kirill Gerstein is a showman, a philosopher, and a poet of the piano. He grew up playing jazz, switched to classical and won the Arthur Rubinstein International Piano Master Competition at just 22. Since then, he has carved out a formidable reputation as a fearless artist who makes the impossible sound easy.

For this seven-city solo recital tour, he is scaling new heights of virtuosity: Liszt’s power Polonaise in E, Schumann’s Viennese romp, Carnival of Vienna, and the wildly difficult, wildly entertaining transcriptions of eccentric piano nerd, Leopold Godowsky. In the same program, he dives deep into the profundity of Chopin’s Polonaise-Fantaisie, and gives the world premiere of Transcendental Etude, a new commission from Australian Liza Lim.

"A peerless performer with so much to express "

— Guardian

"Uncanny delicacy in one episode and gnashing power the next "

— The New York Times

KIRILL GERSTEIN piano

CHOPIN Polonaise-Fantaisie in A-flat major, Op. 61
FAURÉ Nocturne No. 13 in B minor, Op. 119
POULENC Three Intermezzi, FP71/118
LISZT Polonaise in E major, S. 223 No. 2
SCHUMANN Carnival of Vienna, Op. 26
LIZA LIM Transcendental Etude (2023)*
GODOWSKY Symphonic Metamorphoses, No.2: Die Fledermaus

*World premiere performances. Commissioned for Musica Viva Australia with funds from the Hildegard Project, championing the work of female composers

Liza Lim

Liza Lim is a composer, educator and researcher whose music focuses on collaborative and transcultural practices. Beauty, rage & noise, ecological connection, and female spiritual lineages are at the heart of recent
works such as Sex Magic (2020) for Claire Chase; the orchestral cycle, Annunciation Triptych: Sappho, Mary, Fatimah (2019–22), and the piano concerto World as Lover, World as Self (2021). Her large-scale cycle Extinction Events and Dawn Chorus (2018) has found especially wide resonance internationally and highlights
ecological listening to more-than human realms.

Commissioned for Musica Viva Australia by the Hildegard Project, supporting female composers. Liza Lim’s new work will be premiered by Kirill Gerstein on our national tour.