Chopin Argerich

This disc contains performances from Argerich at her most volatile and inspirational. The Preludes and the Scherzo dates from the 1970s and the remainder of the disc date from the 1960s. The whole program has been remastered and the sound thus achieved is no cause for concern. The performances themselves are from a time when Argerich was still in her youth and they give no quarter in terms of being emotionally super-charged. In the hands of lesser pianists some may describe these types of interpretations as impetuous but that suggests a lack of previous thought. In this case these performances, which are certainly emotionally driven and at white heat, betray no such casualness. Instead the impression gained is that of intense emotionalism intensely controlled.

There has never been a more exciting pianist that Martha Argerich. Throughout her career, any appearance by her guarantees sellout crowds and an evening of memorable, not to say insane, music making. She has always drastically limited her repertoire about a dozen concertos, a few more solo and chamber works and will not perform or record solo recitals at all any more. But every single thing that she has recorded is a prime recommendation, plain and simple. She's one of the very few artists whose recordings one should collect just because of whom she is: unique and incomparable. These two concertos perfectly illustrate her gifts as an interpreter. Your ears will be glued to your speakers.

This is a fine specimen of what duo-playing can and should be. My pleasure in this record is in no small measure down to my enthusiasm for these particular works, among the most attractive and significant products of early romanticism. Chopin's cello sonata seems to me an even better work than his piano sonatas. None other than Tovey gives it high marks for construction, even forgetting for once to include his near-invariable reference to Beethoven as the benchmark in all such matters. Chopin had written for the cello in his early years, and the opus 3 introduction-and-polonaise is included here, but the sonata has a sheer self-assurance about that sounds as if he had been composing for it all his life.

Martha Argerich's involvement with chamber music has dominated the later part of her career, so it's easy to think of her name with the words "and friends" tacked on, and to visualize the large and diverse retinue of famous musicians who have recorded with her. This triple-disc box set from EMI Classics presents live recordings from the 2010 Progetto Martha Argerich in Lugano, several of them collaborations with Argerich, notably in works by Robert Schumann, Franz Liszt, and Béla Bartók, as well as a performance of Frédéric Chopin's Piano Concerto No. 1 in E minor, where she is the featured soloist with the Orchestra della Svizzera Italiana.

Here, on this richly filled CD, is a positive cornucopia of musical genius. Martha Argerich's 1961 disc remains among the most spectacular of all recorded debuts, an impression reinforced by an outsize addition and encore: her 1972 Liszt Sonata. True, there are occasional reminders of her pianism at its most fraught and capricious (Chopin's Barcarolle) as well as tiny scatterings or inaccuracies, yet her playing always blazes with a unique incandescence and character.

Featuring the Great Chopin Pianists from the past and today, Deutsche Grammophon presents a 28 CD box edition highlighting the riches of its Chopin catalogue, including eight Chopin competition winners and many of the most legendary Chopin artists of all time.

The box comprises all (live) recordings made by Martha Argerich at the Lugano Festival, from 2002 to the last edition in 2016, and released by EMI Classics and Warner Classics. An impressive collection of 22CDs without equivalent. It includes a variety of genres: some solo piano music, lots of music for piano duo and among them many arrangements, chamber works and concertos.