Connor Heraghty in Chichester

 Connor Heraghty, Chichester Cathedral, Nov 2

Radio 3 Unwind and Classic FM's Calm Classics of a late evening offer nothing but such pieces as Beethoven's Moonlight Sonata, first movement. It might not have been how he intended his Piano Sonata No. 14 in C-sharp minor, Op. 27, No. 2, to be commodified, though. It's a tremendous piece of music, so popular in its day that it began to annoy him, but it was a prelude to further music without which - to risk being overly fastidious- it isn't complete. 

In the 1970's I heard the most radical interpretation of the piece ever with the craziest tempi. And then I realized my mother had played the LP at 45rpm when putting it onto the cassette. Gladly, Connor Heraghty's approach was more orthodox, its scintillating beauty suspending the cathedral audience in its spell. Some restraint was carried forward into the Allegretto before the rolling urgency of the Presto. 

But today's unique selling point was the visual presentation of artwork by the Brazilian artist, Elizabeth Dorazio, on the big screen, Everything is an Illusion. The monochrome mysteries that had accompanied the early parts of the sonata gave way to planets, maps and terrain seen from above. Some might say 'thought provoking' but then they would need to say what thoughts had been provoked. Many things to many different people, probably, and it can be a good idea not to interpret 'modern art' too specifically.

Connor had begun with the bright colours of Impressões seresteiras by Villa-Lobos with equally vibrant plant life art that invited comparison with Frida Kahlo, its abundance likely to have come from the rainforest.

Two Preludes by Rachmaninov were different again, and from each other. Op. 23 no. 4 was a lush adagio while an installation of a vast waterfall canvas was erected in the rainforest nearby super-imposed ruined cathedral architecture and then Op. 3 no. 2 was sombre and more desolate but becoming more imposing over some more dense foliage. Whether there were insects to be seen in these leaves might have depended on one's imagination or capacity for voluntary hallucination.

Cláudio Santoro's music will be investigated further with some priority after the two Prelúdio in which the pale light provided an almost uncanny prelude to Erik Satie's haunted Gnoissienne no. 1. Delicately modulated by Connor's immaculate intonation, it showed what the Chichester Yamaha is capable of because I'm not sure all pianos could do that. The hushed wonder and disquiet, ending with pictures of galaxies and deep space, made for possibly the most memorable three minutes of music I've heard this year having begun with the advantage of being a favourite piece of mine for fifty years.

To finish, the visuals were sub-aquatic - coral reefs and exotic fish- with Debussy's L'isle joyeuse from the Modernist part of his oeuvre, densely rhythmic almost to the point of becoming arrhythmic to make for a vivid finale.

Such abundance is initially difficult to assimilate into themes and meanings but one might begin to risk an interpretation by taking on that very idea. Perhaps one part of what it meant was to contemplate that richness of life on earth in its tiny place in the universe and thus be  led to ecological and environmental concerns, which are major enough and crucial, but it would be too narrow to say that's what it was all about. It could mean what you want it to mean without being shackled to one commentary so after all that, and having had it pointed out that Everything is an Illusion, I'm not saying anything beyond that it will stay in the memory and if you ever see this show advertised anywhere that you can get to you should go.