It should have been Handel’s Water Music, or maybe Le Mer by Debussy, or even Wager’s Wringing Out Cycle.

But when this music lover’s house was flooded out by rivers bursting their banks in Orenburg, in south-western Russia, he went for something perhaps more lively.

The clip emerged on social media as tens of thousands of homes in the region face flooding due to unprecedented amounts of snow melting and overwhelming local waterways.

As the footage begins with floodwater lapping around his knees, the pianist, identified only as Daniil, rips into a lively Hungarian csardas, a wildly fast, traditional folk dance tune.

Daniil is seen playing a virtually note-perfect version of the tune even though the rising water threatens to wash away his upright piano.

As the camera pans around, the whole house appears to be under nearly three feet of water before the footage ends.

Local emergency services have put the entire region in Russia and over the border in Kazakhstan on flood alert.

Kazakhstan president Kassym-Jomart Tokayev has declared the flooding a national disaster and on 16th April he ordered his government to increase funds to tackle the situation.

The floods in Russia are said to be the worst in living memory, caused by a combination of fast-melting snow and heavy rain.

At least 200,000 people have been evacuated, according to local media reports.