The Talent Season 1 Episode 8: Cellist Gabriel Liu and Pianist Charlie Wu
This week’s episode will feature performances from cellist Gabriel Liu and pianist Charlie Wu, including works of Cassado, Beethoven, Bach and more. Tune in to hear the performers and feedback from guest mentor Blair Harris. More about the performers below!
Gabriel Liu
Cello
Fifteen-year-old Melbourne-born cellist Gabriel Liu began playing the cello at the age of seven. He currently studies with David Berlin, Principal Cello of the Melbourne Symphony Orchestra, and Rachel Atkinson, Head of the Music Academy at Camberwell Grammar School. Gabriel is a full music scholar at Camberwell Grammar School. He has participated in masterclasses with internationally acclaimed cellists including Li-Wei Qin, Danjulo Ishizaka, Howard Penny, Eduardo Vassallo, Ben Davies and Nick Trygstad.
He has received prizes in numerous eisteddfods across Victoria, including Monash, Boroondara and Ringwood, and was joint winner of the Ringwood Eisteddfod Grand Final. He was also a top three finalist in Season 1 (2024) of The Talent, presented by 3MBS. In June 2024, he was awarded the LMusA Diploma with Distinction and was invited to perform at the 2025 AMEB Conferring of Diplomas ceremony. He was also a finalist in the Preston Youth Concerto Competition in 2025.
In September 2025, Gabriel attended the Cello Akademie Rutesheim in Germany, where Professor Danjulo Ishizaka selected him as the sole outstanding student in his masterclass to perform in the festival’s solo concert.
Gabriel has performed with the Melbourne Youth Orchestra flagship ensemble since the age of 11. In 2026, he served as Associate Principal Cellist of the Australian Youth Orchestra’s Amadio Chamber Orchestra and, at the age of 14, was among the youngest musicians selected for the AYO flagship orchestra.
As a member of the Kingussie Trio alongside David Chon and Dillon Chan, Gabriel was awarded Second Prize in the Australian national youth chamber music competition Strike A Chord 2025. In 2024, the trio was also a finalist in Strike A Chord 2024, receiving the 3MBS Prize. The trio also won the Boroondara Chamber Music Competition and the MSV Chamber Music Competition in 2025.
In addition to cello, Gabriel is a passionate pianist. He has studied with Len Vorster since the age of five and was awarded his AMusA Diploma in Piano with Distinction in 2023. He enjoys exploring a wide range of musical styles, has a strong interest in music production and film scoring, and is also an avid singer.
Gabriel will perform:
- Suite for cello, 1st mvt. - Cassado
- Cello sonata no. 5 in D major, 1st mvt - Beethoven
Charlie Wu
Piano
At just 13 years of age, Melbourne-born Charlie Wu has already established himself as one of Australia’s brightest young musical talents. He is a Year 8 student, and leads the 2nd violins in his School Orchestra at Caulfield Grammar School, and studies piano with Glenn Riddle at the Melbourne Conservatorium of Music.
In 2024, Charlie made his concerto debut performing Mendelssohn’s Piano Concerto No 1 in G minor with the Russian State Academic Symphony Orchestra in Moscow, conducted by Ivan Nikiforchin. Then in 2025 he was invited to perform Haydn’s Piano Concerto in D major with Les Solistes de Neuchâtel in Geneva conducted by Sergey Ostrovsky, and in March this year Charlie performed the first movement of Rachmaninoff’s Piano Concerto No 3 (the ‘Shine’ Concerto) with the Hilton Head Symphony Orchestra in South Carolina, USA. Concerto performances with local orchestras include Liszt’s Piano Concerto No 2 in A major (with Melbourne Sinfonia), Beethoven’s Triple Concerto (Cloud Concert Orchestra), Mendelssohn’s Piano Concerto No 1 (with the Preston Symphony and Whitehorse Symphony Orchestras), and Rachmaninoff’s Piano Concerto No 3, with the Camerata Orchestra conducted by Doug Heywood.
Internationally, Charlie’s numerous awards include winning 1st Prize, as well as the Special Prize for a work by a Swiss composer, in the 2025 Concours International Musicale de Genève in Switzerland. In March 2026 Charlie was awarded 3rd Prize in the Hilton Head International Piano Competition, held in South Carolina in the USA. He was also a Diplomate in the prestigious 2024 Gand Piano International Piano Competition held in Moscow. Locally, Charlie’s awards include 1st Prize in the 2025 Boroondara Open Age Piano Concerto Competition, 1st prizes in the Musical Society of Victoria’s 2025 Nehama Patkin and Eda Schurmann Awards, 1st prize in the 2024 PolMusicA National Polish Music Competition, and the Dandenong Ranges Music Council’s 2024 Bill Borthwick Prize. In 2024 Charlie was awarded his LMusA piano Diploma with Distinction, his examiners commenting that his performance exhibited ‘exceptional qualities of artistic insight’ and ‘transcendental virtuosity’.
2026 is a busy year for Charlie. He has been invited to present solo recitals for St Paul’s Cathedral, Scots Church Music Matinees, St George’s Anglican Church Concert Series in Travancore, for U3A in Hawthorn, for Camberwell Music Society’s Subscription Concert Series and for the Diamond Creek Concert Series. He will also be featured on the 3 MBS ‘Talent’ program. In 2026 Charlie has been invited to perform Rachmaninoff’s Concerto No 3 with the Maroondah Symphony Orchestra, as well as Mozart’s Piano Concerto in A major, K 414 with the Mozart Festival Chamber Players at 45 Downstairs as part of Coady Green’s Mozart Piano Concerto Festival. In November he has also been invited to give two solo recitals at the Albury Chamber Music Festival.
Charlie is a keen chamber musician, and enjoys playing tennis, swimming and chess.
Charlie will perform:
- Bach’s Prelude & Fugue in C sharp minor (Bk2 of the Well-Tempered Clavier)
- Liszt’s Transcendental Etude No 4, ‘Mazeppa’