This is what happens when the amateur reviewer bumps into his piano teacher in the bar of the Queen Elizabeth Hall during the interval of a Paul Lewis recital.

Amateur Reviewer (sipping glass of white wine): "I wasn't sure about the Chopin. It seemed to lack a bit of freedom. I wanted the melodies to sing a bit more."

Piano teacher: "But that was the whole point."

AR: "Ah. It was?"

PT: "That was the reason he coupled the Barcarolle and the Fourth Ballade with the Scriabin and the Busoni. He wanted to point up the connections. The darkness. The internal textures. So clever the way he mixed Busoni and Scriabin so you couldn't tell which was which."

AR: "Ah."

PT: "It was marvellously cerebral. Absorbing."

AR: "Absorbing. Well, of course."

PT: "A wonderful change from the 'lyrical' Chopin we usually get. The obvious."

And at the word "obvious" the piano teacher looked over the top of his spectacles in the familiar expression of crushing disappointment.

And so we returned to our seats for what we had all really come for. Lewis has carved out a formidable reputation as an interpreter of Schubert. But now he has moved on to Beethoven - and this was to be his first bash (at least before a London audience) of the greatest of them all, opus 111.

He first gave us an intelligent, well-controlled performance of one of the most Schubertian of them all - the opus 90 sonata. But the best was saved for last - a wonderfully deliberate and, yes, cerebral opus 111. Which is not to say it was without drama, or passion or excitement. It had all that. But there was also a refusal to be rushed, a compelling sense of the overall structure, majesty and depth of the piece.

The first movement bled straight into the second, with every single note of the Adagio theme shaped and placed exactly. There followed a beautifully calibrated progression through the variations, each building in speed and intensity - and then retreating into the alternating passages of dappled sun and chilly shadow. This amateur reviewer couldn't think of a more arresting performance, on CD or in the concert hall. He suspected his teacher agreed.