Browse: Presto Recordings of the Year, Chopin (composer)

The quality of this playing is altogether exceptional. Pianist Benjamin Grosvenor takes nothing for granted in music. Nor should we in listening to him...he plainly understands that every interpretation... — BBC Music Magazine, October 2014, More…

The solemn Arpeggione is prefigured here by Isserlis’s arrangement of Chopin’s achingly beautiful ‘Nie ma czego trzeba’. Again in this Sonata, the duo offer graceful transparency, lithe refinement... — BBC Music Magazine, November 2018, More…

The glorious ebb and flow of melodic material that courses through the veins of the Rachmaninov and Chopin Sonatas seems absolutely tailor-made for a cellist with the flamboyance and intensity... — BBC Music Magazine, January 2016, More…

he plays [the Mozart] with restraint, albeit micromanaging the music so that no phrase sounds the same twice...[in the Chopin] Sokolov ranges from introspective musing to his native Russian virtuosity. — Financial Times, 31st January 2015, More…

They are all works requiring formidable technical ability, and pianist Alexander Melnikov brings clarity of touch and virtuoso flair to them all, transferring as if effortlessly from instrument... — BBC Music Magazine, May 2018, More…

he really is phenomenal: this music seems to flow out of him with such relaxed and elegant perfection — BBC Music Magazine, March 2016, More…

…his playing is unfailingly cultivated and his sound beautifully focused and poised.[Concerto in E minor]…Cho commands the work, and he leads the dance in the finale — BBC Music Magazine, May 2017, More…

[The recital] has all the light and shade expected from such a varied programme…Li’s style is thoughtful and expressive, rather than exciting, and the concert recording gives the performance... — BBC Music Magazine, December 2017, More…

True, she sails perilously close to over-sentimentalising the opening Romanza...but Fliter plays with grace and heartfelt sincerity - abetted by some lovely duetting with the SCO's bassoonist... — Gramophone Magazine, March 2014 More…

Both play [the Franck] with poetry and warmth but can turn solid where coolly patrician tone is needed, and the air only really clears in time for the floating, sweet lyricism of the finale.... — BBC Music Magazine, March 2020, More…