Chopin: Piano Concerto No. 2 in F minor, Op. 21

A long-awaited recording: Lang Lang performs Chopin’s Piano Concertos Nos. 1 & 2, two of the most beloved pieces in the repertoire. Lang Lang has performed these concertos for many years with many different orchestras before deciding to bring his interpretations into the recording studio. Here he is partnered by the supreme musicianship of the Wiener Philharmoniker and Zubin Mehta, who ensure that the orchestral part is far more than mere accompaniment. Both concertos were recorded in the world-renown acoustic conditions of the Vienna Musikverein’s Golden Hall, concerto No. 1 in a live-performance and concerto No. 2 in studio conditions.

Lang Lang has frequently received highest praise for his readings of Chopin’s Piano Concertos; their mixture of virtuosic expressiveness and lyrical tone bringing forth some of his most acclaimed performances.

PentaTone is proud to present their first release featuring the spectacular new pianist Sa Chen. Already a star in her native China, Sa Chen has won the Leeds Piano Competition (1994) The Chopin Piano Competiton (1996) and the Van Cliburn in 2005.

This SACD comes packaged with a DVD featuring Sa Chen interviewed by James Jolly (Editor in Chief of Gramophone) and footage from the recording sessions showing one complete movement from each concerto. Sa Chen will be featured as “One To Watch” (special page in Gramophone, November issue) and also BBC Music Magazine. We are all aware that Deutsche Gramophone is releasing an album comprising exactly the same works performed by Lang Lang. Actually it is an interesting phenomenon that two young Chinese artists record the same works and we hope and expect that the media will compare both albums.

Winner of the Young Concert Artists Competition, Vassily Primakov, the young Russian/American virtuoso, has created an impressive buzz in the classical music world.

This new Chopin disc presents Primakov's first concerto recordings. Both the Chopin Concertos were recorded in May of 2008 with the Odense Symphony Orchestra directed by British conductor Paul Mann

This release is the first in a series devoted to Arthur Rubinstein’s ‘middle period’ Chopin cycle, recorded from the mid-1940s through the mid-1950s.

Long admired by Rubinstein aficionados, these interpretations (the pianist’s second of both works) have been said to combine the fire and youthful exuberance of his 1930s recordings with the greater maturity and structural coherence that characterize his final stereo tapings.

The 1946 Carnegie Hall recording of Concerto No. 2 boasts excellent sound quality due to the use of lacquer discs later transferred to tape for LP release.

"Rubinstein is one of the most elegant of all Chopin pianists. He has a sense of stylistic ease and distinction that is almost patrician.” MusicWeb International