Guan, 21, chose to play works written by great composers who were all in their 20s at the time these works were composed.

St Matthew’s Church, with its tiled floor and soaring ceiling, was ideal acoustically for this event hosted by the Murray Conservatorium.

Guan didn’t perform sacred music, although Chopin’s Funeral March from his Piano Sonata No. 2 was played not only at Chopin’s funeral but those of presidents John Kennedy and Leonid Brezhnev.

Using no sheet music, Guan knows this sonata of four movements intimately, from its rolling thunder at the start to gentler sections that precede the final whirlwind.

The pianist is also a devotee of Mozart and from the composer’s vast repertoire selected the Piano Sonata K333, written in Vienna when Mozart was 27.

It contains some incredibly fast sections, but Guan ably interpreted the torrent of sound.

Guan chose works by Ravel and Rachmaninov for the second part of his 90-minute recital, Moments Musicaux written by the latter when he was only 23.

Prolonged applause brought an exuberant encore.

The Sydney-born pianist, who studied at Shanghai Conservatorium when he was 10 before returning to Sydney, clearly has a great future ahead.

He is still a student at the Sydney Conservatium and yet has behind him several solo recitals in China.