Australians Coady Green and Leigh Harrold gave a stunning recital on CABS Day in the ambient Recital Room.

The programme began with Schubert’s Fantaisie in F minor, a piece that captures much of Schubert’s preoccupation with poverty and ill-health at the end of his short life of 31 years. The performers put across the music’s long drawn out emotional journeying, as it moved from exuberance to melancholy and back again.

Ravel’s Mother Goose Suite came next, with verses in between each section read by Benn Lombard, who also performs at HIFA. Not meant to be taken too seriously (the Suite was premiered by two 12-year-old girls), it was performed here in a spirit of fun, at turns picturesque, exotic, and not a little magical.

There followed Czerny’s variations on a Theme from Auber’s Le Macon, which was delightful, sparklingly clear with lots of elaborate finger work, as well as some rich early Romantic harmony that clearly showed the influence of Beethoven.

Liszt’s Hungarian Rhapsody no 2 concluded the programme, and was a thrilling experience, stern at first but later thunderously exciting, full of surprises, at turns frenetic and then suddenly light and almost uncertain, with pedalling by Leigh throughout.