Artur Pizarro may have seen this St George's recital as an antidote to the more cerebral nature of his Beethoven sonata cycle, due to reach its climax at St John's Smith Square in London next month. A programme of arrangements and variations in which Chopin provided the connecting thread was a technical rather than an intellectual challenge, and Pizarro made it a dazzling display of physical prowess. Chopin's Six Polish Songs in the arrangements by Franz Liszt were an immediate assertion of musical pedigree: Pizarro can trace a direct line back to Liszt through his teacher Sequeira Costa and Costa's mentor Vianna da Motta, one of Liszt's last pupils.

Pizarro proved himself the equal of the keyboard giants to whom he paid homage, particularly in Leopold Godowsky's studies for left hand based on Chopin's Op 10 Etudes with their polyphonic voicing and vast spans. The arrangements by Mily Balakirev and Earl Wild, respectively, of the slow movements of Chopin's two piano concertos allowed Pizarro to indulge a poetic legato tone, though, again, the technical complexities were despatched with a curiously determined nonchalance.

Most absorbing were the two sets of variations based on themes by Chopin: Frederic Mompou's set based on the Prelude in A major, and that of Rachmaninov on the Prelude in C minor. Mompou's lyricism and wit emerged strongly, while, in the Rachmaninov, it was the clarity with which Pizarro outlined the raw material presented in the theme, its subtle transformations and then the gradual orbit into quite another dimension of keyboard power, that was exemplary. That mitigated against any charges of mere showmanship.