The sixth annual BIGLAKE Festival got off to a thrilling start with a pair of sold-out concerts by two of Canadian classical music’s brightest rising stars.

The festival opened on Friday night with two musical superstars, violinist Kerson Leong and pianist Philip Chiu, both winners of multiple awards and with careers that have taken them around the globe. The program they played was all part of the violin repertoire, which technically casts the pianist in the role of accompanist; in reality, the two musicians were equal partners in the creation of some extraordinary, and extraordinarily demanding, music. One piece, Francis Poulenc’s Violin Sonata, required them to play in unison for extended periods, something many musicians dread in live performance: it must be executed flawlessly or the piece is ruined. To rise to this challenge, musicians require discipline, superb communication, and lots of practice. Leong and Chiu, despite acknowledging early in the concert that they had not performed together for several years, played the piece as if they had one mind controlling four hands. This was only one of many signs of the exceptional rapport that exists between these two musicians.

The program included many opportunities for Leong to demonstrate the virtuosity that one expects from a violin recital. The concert opened with Fratres by Arvo Pärt, a piece that goes from melodies of aching beauty to searing intensity from one moment to the next. Indeed, beauty and intensity characterized the whole concert, with the latter best exemplified by Eugène Ysaÿe’s Sonata no. 2 (subtitled “Obsession,” and famous for the ancient dies irae motif that recurs throughout it), and the former by Ralph Vaughan Williams’s famous tone poem The Lark Ascending. Leong excels at violin pyrotechnics, executing the fastest fingering and most challenging double stops with precision, but perhaps most impressive is his mastery of the bow. Many times during the concert, Leong faded to the quietest pianissimo, just at the threshold of hearing; this is extraordinarily difficult to do on the violin, because the slightest variation in bowing speed or pressure will cause the pitch to change, or, worse, a scraping sound. The complete control over his sound shows why Leong has earned so many accolades.

After a concert that was almost relentless in its intensity, one of the three encores featured “The Dance of the Blessed Spirits” by Christoph Willibald Gluck, a simple and beautiful melody in which Leong made his violin seem to sing. Impressive as his virtuosity is, one looks forward to hearing more of this type of lyrical playing from this arresting musician.

On the second night, Philip Chiu returned for a solo piano recital, featuring some of the best-loved pieces in the repertoire, including Claude Debussy’s “Clair de Lune,” Beethoven’s “Moonlight Sonata,” and four of Rachmaninov’s Preludes, as well as some less well-known selections such as the Brazilian folk-music-inspired rhythms of Heitor Villa-Lobos. The emotional range of this evening’s concert was very broad, amply showcasing the excellence of the Fazioli grand piano generously loaned to the Festival by Toronto’s Remenyi House of Music. Under Chiu’s hands this instrument filled the room with Rachmaninov’s enormous chords, but also rendered Debussy’s most delicate melodies with translucent beauty.

Not only is Chiu a masterful player, but he also speaks about the music he plays with passion and humour. Chiu introduced each piece he played with an off-the-cuff speech, not about their technical details but rather why they matter, what their composers were trying to say, and what they expected of the audience. The audience seemed as charmed with this element of the performance as they were were with Chiu’s playing, which was masterful: powerful when it needed to be, delicate when called for, and at all times beautiful.

The Festival continues until August 29. On the 28th, Leong and Chiu return to the stage, this time with the Philharmonisches Streichquartett from Berlin to play two concertos for violin, piano, and string quartet. Tickets are available from www.biglakearts.com.