This edition is of special significance for several reasons. It represents the first time that Chopin’s works were recorded on an historical instrument by a single artist. More importantly, however, it constitutes both the climax and the final accent in Tatiana Shebanova’s phonographic output; it is to this set of recordings that the career and performance style of this outstanding pianist appear to lead. When she encountered the fortepiano, all of Shebanova’s qualities—her natural sensitivity to timbre, her exceptional ability to selectively and cogently shape the texture of a work, her reverence for the composer’s text—gained new energy. This occurred quite late, when Shebanova already held a solid position on the world’s major concert platforms and had a very extensive repertoire at her disposal. It actually happened too late: fate decreed that this new love had only a few years to develop. Awareness of the ineluctable course of events prompted her to muster her forces and take on her dream project of recording the complete works of Chopin on his instrument. Grzegorz Michalski