Rossini: Prélude inoffensif (Péchés de vieillesse, vol 7 Album de chaumière)
Schumann: Sonata No.1 in F-sharp minor, Op. 11
Interval
Lowell Liebermann: Gargoyles, Op. 29
Schumann: Humoreske, Op. 20

BBC Young Musician of the Year 2018 winner Lauren Zhang, opens her programme with one of Rossini’s short piano pieces from the collection he jokingly titled ‘Péchés de vieillesse’ (Sins of old age). Schumann follows - his music was always a reflection of his personal life and this sonata, composed when his beloved Clara Wieck had been sent away by her father, is no exception. It was, he later told Clara, ‘a solitary outcry for you from my heart …in which your theme appears in every possible shape’.

Post-interval, Lauren introduces Gargoyles, a 4-movement impressionistic piano suite by American composer Lowell Liebermann. The title refers to the overall mood of the piece, a riveting combination of the humorous and the macabre. According to The Washington Post, at the 1989 premiere in Alice Tully Hall, New York City, the final movement ‘produced an audience response close to hysteria’.