Chopin: Prelude Op. 28 No. 14 in E flat minor

Master pianist Maurizio Pollini turned 70 on January 5th, 2012 and DG are celebrating this milestone birthday with a new album of breath-taking Chopin. Pollini’s Chopin recordings are his best-sellers – the complete Nocturnes, released in 2005, have sold more than 100,000 CDs to date.

Chopin: Preludes is a birthday programme of newly recorded solo works: Preludes op.28, four Mazurkas op.30, two Nocturnes op.27, and the Scherzo no.2 op.31. Pollini often feature Chopin’s works in his solo recitals – The Guardian raved, “... he still plays Chopin with the ease that floored even Rubinstein more than 50 years ago ...”

Sheila Arnold’s performances show Chopin’s works in a new light; through the thrilling grasps of the perfomer, born in India and now a German pianist, who grapples intensively with historical instruments on all levels, producing a different sound and a complete new dimension on the pieces. She performs on an Érard Fortepiano (Paris 1839).

Wojciech Switala has won prizes in a number of international competitions: in Bardolino, Italy (First Prize), the Long/Thibaud in Paris (Second Grand Prix, audience prize, prize for the leading European) and the Montreal Piano Competition. In the Twelfth Fryderyk Chopin International Piano Competition in Warsaw (1990) he received the prize for the best performance of a polonaise.

The disc features new recordings of the 24 Preludes, Op. 28 made on a Pleyel piano from 1848 and Andante spianato et Grande Polonaise in E flat major, Op. 22 made on an Erard piano from 1849.

Recorded in Witold Lutoslawski Polish Radio Concert Studio, Warsaw, 11–13 November 2006 and 4 May 2007.

Ka Ling Colleen Lee, a rising star of Chopin interpretation, has won numerous awards at many leading piano competitions, including sixth prize at the Fifteenth International Chopin Piano Competition in Warsaw. Her sense of form and particular sensitivity to the timbres of the instrument have borne fruit in outstanding renderings of the B minor Sonata and the Polonaise-fantasy. Both these works appear on this disc, alongside Mazurkas from Op. 33 and six Preludes from Op. 28.

Debut release on ONYX from the legendary virtuoso and poet of the keyboard Nikolai Demidenko.

Recognised as one of the great Chopin players of our time, he recently performed these works during the Chopin Experience weekend on BBC Radio 3. This is his first recording of the Preludes.

Bryce Morrison in Gramophone magazine praised his last Chopin recital disc: "Demidenko's razor-sharp articulacy and immaculate dexterity are complemented by the finest musical grace and individuality" (Editor’s Choice, 2007)

Demidenko won the International Tchaikovsky Competition in 1978, recorded a highly acclaimed series of discs in the 80s and 90s (mainly on Hyperion) including a Gramophone award-winning disc of Medtner Concertos. As a young man he was widely acclaimed as a firebrand virtuoso but this was never the whole story and like a good wine his playing has matured gloriously. Now with new management.

This second volume of Moiseiwitsch’s Chopin recordings focuses on the complete Préludes, Op. 28, which the great pianist had attempted to record, unsuccessfully, with the acoustic process, and the Four Ballades. The recording of the complete Préludes is one of the most satisfactory on disc, as Moiseiwitsch captures perfectly the mood of each of these miniature masterpieces. The slower preludes in particular show Moiseiwitsch’s understanding of musical phrasing linked to harmonic progressions. The recording of the Ballade No. 4, his only 78rpm recording of the work, derives from a test pressing. All tracks were recorded in Studio 3, Abbey Road, London