Rachmaninov: Étude-Tableau, Op. 39 No. 6 in A minor

“Wonders galore in Rachmaninov's playing, beyond its obvious historical importance. Cast-iron technique, proper old-school sense of line and tone colour, and an incomparable rubato.” BBC Music Magazine, May 2013 *****

“No composer or pianist has ever sounded more indelibly Russian, and never more so than in his own music...What clear relish and delight in the playful rather than melancholic capers of the Polka, what vitality and aplomb in the festive E major Prelude...this, the thrid volume of Naxos's 'Great Pianists' Rachmaninov, gives us playing beyond price.” Gramophone Magazine, January 2013

“there's an admirable lightness of touch and appreciation of rhythmic flow to her "Für Elise", and her negotiation of Liszt's "Un Sospiro" is captivating.” The Independent, 7th July 2012 ****

“This recital disc of short piano pops proves Lisitsa's technical skill rather than the potential depth or reach of her musicality. She opens, in reckless mood, with Rachmaninov's Prelude in G Minor, then settles into an elegant Für Elise” The Observer, 9th July 2012

“genuine gifts for lyricism and dazzling display...those musical gifts quickly hit the ears on this closely recorded CD.... Track three is Liszt’s La campanella, intelligently shaped, its bell sounds glittering as rarely before...Lisitsa tends to play with the lights fully on, with not enough shading in the wide expanse between loud and quiet. This gets rather tiring...But at the moment there is only one Valentina Lisitsa.” The Times, 13th July 2012 ***

“Lisitsa emerges as a hugely confident and spontaneous performer. There's grace in her turns of phrase and relish in her sense of rhetoric...Sometimes, though, a downside appears when loud passages threaten to career a tad out of control and miss their point.” BBC Music Magazine, December 2012 ***

“Time and again Wang shows us why she’s become the world’s darling, whether shading dynamics poetically in a morsel of Gluck’s Orfeo ed Euridice, clarifying the multiple layers in Albéniz’s Triana, or romping with the preposterous glitter of Horowitz’s Carmen Variations.” The Times, 23rd March 2012 ****

“A disc of encores needs a compelling executant to justify itself, but this young pianist’s technique is quietly transcendent, her musicianship zestful and profound. The sequence itself is satisfying.” Sunday Times, 1st April 2012

“In the Saint-Saens-Horowitz Danse macabre Wang storms the heights and her playing is of an unquenchable virtuosity. She herself declares all these pieces to be among her most cherished encores, and she has been superbly recorded in them.” Gramophone Magazine, June 2012

“No point trying to fault anything: the lightness and flexibility of her touch takes the breath away, and her sound is at every moment transparently controlled, each piece displaying insight and affection...Given that these bonnes bouches were never designed to be consumed in bulk, this young virtuoso has pulled off a remarkable feat.” BBC Music Magazine, June 2012 *****

“At least two outstanding recordings of Rachmaninov's Second Piano Sonata have come my way in recent years (from Yevgeny Sudbin on BIS, and Simon Trpceski on EMI)… Yet Denis Matsuev's performance… is a formidable achievement, demonstrating breathtaking control of the complex polyphonic writing, while negotiating the ebb and flow of the musical argument with great purpose and direction.” BBC Music Magazine, February 2008 *****

“Denis Matsuev is a virtuoso in the grandest of grand Russian traditions who returns us to the great days of Emil Gilels. He possesses the sort of technique which begins where others end, and here in Rachmaninov his playing is truly 'stewed in Russian juices'.
His recital, entitled 'Unknown Rachmaninov', is in fact a mix of the familiar and newly discovered.
And while the piano version of the D minor orchestral Suite is hardly characteristic, let alone vintage Rachmaninov, it is played up to the hilt by Matsuev. The D minor Fugue is a more convincing discovery with its prophecy of the E minor Moment musicaux demanding and receiving a red-hot virtuosity. Again, Matsuev may have you longing for the fuller 1913 version of the Second Sonata but his playing blazes with such towering strength and conviction that he leaves you with virtually no grounds for complaint.
His pace in the 'Red Riding Hood' A minor Etude-tableau is hair-raising and the earlier Etude in the same key is given with a scale and romantic turbulence that declare the pianist's nationality in every bar. The G minor Prelude can scarcely have been played more stunningly in its entire history. This excellently recorded disc presents the most trenchant and commanding Rachmaninov recital in years.” Gramophone Classical Music Guide, 2010

“Ever since his triumph in the 1998 Tchaikovsky Competition, Denis Matsuev's name has inspired awe and amazement in musical circles. Here is a virtuosos in the grandest of grand Russian traditions who returns us to the great days of Emil Gilels… this excellently recorded disc presents the most trenchant and commanding Rachmaninov recital I have heard in years.” Gramophone Magazine, March 2008