Pianist gives his aural feast a visual touch

"In terms of narrative styles, I feel that these three pieces are a process of steady progression, because their scales are getting grander," Sun says.

"If a sonata is a communication process with a dozen people, a fantasy is like speaking to a hundred people, and Pictures at an Exhibition is like communicating to a thousand people."

Mussorgsky composed the pieces in 1874 as a musical rendition of 10 paintings by the Russian artist Viktor Hartmann.

The suite was then adapted into different styles, one of the most well-received versions being one that the French composer Maurice Ravel orchestrated in 1922.

"Listening to the orchestrated version can inspire me as a pianist, because sometimes I need to use the piano to imitate the timbres of other instruments, and the orchestration could provide reference," Sun says.

"In the last movement of Mussorgsky's suite, the piano imitates the sounds of percussion instruments including bells or gongs. Some light passages mimic sounds of woodwind instruments, and a few hefty pieces such as Cattle draw from those of brass instruments."

Performing at the Beijing Concert Hall for the first time, Sun says that pieces such as Mussorgsky's well suit the venue, which has a rich resonance and allows the pieces to fully exhibit their grandeur.

The concert was his debut in Beijing after he became the only Chinese pianist to have entered the semifinal of the 16th Van Cliburn International Piano Competition held in the United States this year.