The scintillating French pianist Jean-Efflam Bavouzet, an Auckland Philharmonia favourite, returns with Bartók’s gleefully punchy concerto.

 

It is framed by two vivid translations of art into music. Martinů’s vision of the translucent murals of the Renaissance master is followed by artwork from a more obscure figure. The architect and artist Viktor Hartmann would be unknown today had he not been a close friend of Mussorgsky, who mourned his early death by immortalising his pictures in a suite for piano. 48 years later, Maurice Ravel transformed it into one of the most spectacular orchestral showpieces of them all.