David Stanhope is an Australian conductor, composer, horn-player and trombonist who claims he only occasionally finds time to practise the piano. He need have no fears on that score: his playing bursts at the seams with energy and aplomb. Hear him snapping at the heels of the virtuoso chording in Schumann’s Toccata or wonder at the whirling vortex he recreates in Rachmaninov’s F minor Prelude and you are left in no doubt of his force and facility. Sadly, the sixth Prelude is followed by a coldly indifferent response to the restrained poetry of No 7; and if the Brahmsian fullness of No 9 is to be realised it should surely be played Allegro moderato rather than Allegro agitato. None of these performances comes near Moura Lympany (Decca or Testament) or Berezovsky (Mirare, 12/05). Again, Stanhope races through much of Faure’s Ballade, mistaking its dreamlike rapture for display so that the ear finally rebels against so much surface noise and bustle. Tall Poppies faithfully capture the atmosphere of this essentially athletic display.