From the very first note, this enchanting evening feels less like a concert and more like you are stepping into a dream you never want to wake from. There are concerts, and then there are evenings that feel like whispered secrets shared by candlelight. Following its sold-out triumph at the Edinburgh Fringe, pianist Matthew Shiel shines with a performance that dissolves the boundary between recital and reverie. From the first note, amid Pilgrim Uniting Church’s gothic revival architecture, the air seems perfumed with romance and we, the audience, are willing conspirators in a history of passion.

Shiel does not merely play romantic piano pieces, he courts them. With a storyteller’s flair and a virtuoso’s touch, he reveals the forbidden romances and tempestuous love affairs of the great composers, turning familiar names into flesh-and-blood lovers. His touch at the keys is tender, then fervent. Each anecdote draws delighted mirth before melting into music that feels almost indecent in its intimacy.

The evening unfolds like a private letter never meant to be read aloud: hushed into ardent declarations, only to retreat again into moonlit introspection. One senses the composer’s affection woven into every bar, and Shiel responds in kind, shaping the melody as though cradling something fragile and beloved.

What makes this experience so enchanting is its invitation to soften. In a world that clamors for attention, this performance asks only that you listen and feel. By the final cadence, it proves to be romantic without being cloying, educational without ever feeling dutiful. Above all, it is a reminder that love both messy, scandalous, transcendent, has always been the truest muse.

George Street Press Club

Debussy’s Romantic Piano by Candlelight – ‘Clair de Lune continues until 6 March.