This review is for Mrs. Fenwick and Mrs. Boulet, two exacting instructors of the fine art of playing the piano. For much of my childhood, they instilled in me a butterflies-inducing combination of anxiety, exasperation, fear and, on occasion, triumph. Thank you--I think--wherever you are.

The same gamut of emotions pervades the two-man show directed by Bruce Sevy at the North Coast Repertory Theatre, 2 Pianos 4 Hands. Ted (Mark Anders) and Richard (Carl Danielsen) inhabit numerous characters during this whirlwind one-act piece, whose only stage props are two facing baby grand pianos. Not the least of their portrayals are those of the very young Ted and equally young Richard, who themselves are first inhabiting the wondrous and terrifying worlds of piano and classical music. Ted and Richard are Ted Dykstra and Richard Greenblatt, the Canadian creators of this 1996 autobiographical work that’s having its San Diego premiere at North Coast Rep. They are nobly personified here by Anders and Danielsen, who in between bravura piano playing (not only classical music, but sprinkles of pop and jazz) bring tireless energy, humor and even moments of pathos to their sagas of Ted and Richard, which span 15 years.

Each segment unfolds in just a few minutes, with the actor-musicians taking turns as not just Ted and Richard but as their various piano teachers (of both genders), as strict practice-mandating fathers, as conservatory snobs. Later, when the boys have grown into young men and are beginning to discover that all their hard childhood work toward concert-soloist fame may be in vain, the Rep’s co-stars broadly but believably play the parts of a mouthy drunk in a piano bar (Anders), a blunt, boozy jazz-club proprietor (also Anders) and a flutter-brained student from suburbia hell (Danielsen, switching sexes).

Some of the sequences function better than others--you’d expect that in this kind of show. Even the bits that are less successful are wrapped around the timeless music of Bach, Beethoven, Mozart, Liszt, Chopin and other giants from the classical music canon. The intimidated will find solace in a fun mid-show detour into pop, which features a medley of “Bennie and the Jets,” “Imagine” (with saying, anthemic match light), “Linus and Lucy” (with Snoopy dancing), “Great Balls of Fire” (with “fire”) and, funniest of the bunch, “Chariots of Fire,” with slow-motion runner.

For all its intoxicating celebration of music, 2 Pianos 4 Hands makes the very sobering observation that years of practicing and myopic dedication to classical piano produces very few Vladimir Horowitzes or Van Cliburms. (SPOILER ALERT: Even Ted and Richard resign themselves to merely being in adulthood the best piano players in their neighborhood.) This realization is bound to provoke wistful thought in anyone who’s seriously studied the craft, and either relief or regret in those now-grown kids who quit taking lessons.

As theater, 2 Pianos 4 Hands can feel static, with no supporting cast, no costume changes and with the baby grands consuming the stage and somewhat confining the actors’ physicality. Danielsen and (especially) Anders compensate with more than a little facial mugging at the audience and at each other, but also with deft comic timing. It helps that the 90-minute length of the show is just about right.

In piano-practicing time, we are told, an hour and a half is short. Too short.

Mrs. Fenwick and Mrs. Boulet would agree.