Seaton Music Club welcomed two rising stars for their fourth concert of the season on Thursday in the Town Hall.

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Boyan Ivanov is a clarinettist. After winning prizes in his native Bulgaria, he came to London to continue his studies and has performed as a soloist throughout Europe and South Korea, and with chamber groups and orchestras in London concert halls.

Olivia Sham is an Australian pianist currently studying in London, following distinguished studies at the Sydney Conservatorium of Music, who has also given numerous solo, chamber and orchestral performances.

Their performance took the large and enthusiastic audience on a musical tour of Europe – with a quick excursion to America as well. Hommage to Manuel de Falla by the Hungarian composer Béla Kovács for unaccompanied clarinet opened the programme. Intended as a study, the brilliant start and contrasting episodes of the work quickly revealed Boyan Ivanov’s skill and evoked the flavour of Spain.

He was joined by Olivia Sham for the second piece.

Leonard Bernstein’s Sonata for Clarinet and Piano was his first published work. Its three movements had serious moments, but also jazzy vigorous rhythmic sections, which might have come from a Broadway show.

Olivia Sham is a specialist on the music of Franz Liszt. With her thrilling performance of the Hungarian Rhapsody no12, with its range of emotions, dynamics and tone, she seemed to capture effortlessly the melody and spirit of Hungary’s gypsy tradition, and master the enormous demands made by the composer.

The 19th century depiction of gypsies continued when Boyan Ivanov returned with Olivia Sham to play Pablo de Sarasate’s Carmen Fantasy op25. The five sections are based on well-known themes from Bizet’s opera, played as you have never heard them before!

They exploit the full range of the instrument and demand exceptional virtuosity, decorating the themes with teasing ornaments, rippling triplets and ever-more expansive arpeggios.

It was a brilliant conclusion to the first half.

France and Germany were the venues for the second half. Claude Debussy’s Première Rhapsodie, intended as a test piece for the conservatoire, again showed the soloist’s technical dexterity and musical talent in the smooth, dreamy introduction, the expanding melodies and the dramatic conclusion. In Francis Poulenc’s Sonata for Clarinet and Piano, he brought out the composer’s sense of humour, as well as his unmistakeable feeling for melody and rhythm.

The final piece by Carl Maria von Weber, his Grand Duo Concertant, was a virtuoso performance by the two players, where the expressive powers of both instruments were displayed.

The enthusiastic applause was rewarded with an encore for the audience - a modern Bulgarian rondo full of energy and fun - to complete the European tour.

The club’s next concert is on Thursday, February 16, when Alec Frank-Gemmill, John McMunn and Matthew Schellhorn will play some familiar and some less well-known works for tenor, horn and piano.

Peter Dawson