Pianist Maksim Mrvica back in Hong Kong, where his crossover career began

MAKSIM AND HIS BAND
Actor Cultural

Maksim Mrvica considers there to be two turning points in his career. The first was when he won the piano competition in Zagreb in 1993 while the Croatian war of independence was in full swing. The second was when he signed a contract with manager Mel Bush in 2003, after which his career "went completely in a different way overnight".

Mrvica is visibly exhausted when we meet at Parsons Recital Hall in Causeway Bay earlier this month. But despite the persistent jet lag, the classical crossover pianist — with his rocker clobber and totem tattoos — poses like a professional fashion model for our photo shoot, changing postures and directions of his glare every now and then as the photographer snaps away.

"I used to play classical concerts with a laser show on stage and I dressed differently. I just want to break the stereotype of classical music being dead serious and black-and-white," he says. "And because I like electronic music in my private life, when my manager Mel Bush approached me with the idea of changing the music itself, I said 'Yeah, let's do it'."

A decade on, the 39-year-old remains one of the biggest-selling crossover pianists in the world. His first crossover album The Piano Player (2003) was an instant success, especially in Asia where it reached Gold status in various countries. His eccentric, timely takes on classical music — as reflected by eight other albums including Electrik (2006) and The Movies (2012) — continued to earn him new followers.