Favourite Pianists

So we've had favourite/best composer, concerto, work of music etc.

Now lets discuss our favourite pianists.

My list would have to include:

Daniel Barenboim

Vladimir Ashkenazy

possibly Perahia.... possibly Hough as well..

Angela Hewitt

Glenn Gould (for Bach/Beethoven..... not Mozart!)

I don't particularly like many of the popular ones such as Argerich and Uchida, and even some Brendel (although usually good..), but those few I enjoy.

Barenboim sometimes does some questionable things (and sometimes the balance in a concerto is awful), but his violin sonatas of Mozart (with Perlman) are unsurpassed. And he interprets the Beethoven sonatas well.

A couple of less famous ones:

Finghan Collins

Ronald Brautigam (also on fortepiano)

You will note that I don't have any great love for the show-off pianists, such as Evgeny Kissin, Arcadi Volodos etc., although they can produce some lovely music... I just dislike that tradition of virtuosity.

Oh, Ashkenazy, I love his Prokofiev.

Gould is great, I love his Goldberg Variations.

I like Argerich, she does great Prokofiev (minus one quarrel I have with her 3rd piano concerto).

Horowitz was amazing, loved his Rachmaninoff.

Richter was fantastic on the Prokofiev sonatas (especially his debut).

I love Idil Biret's Chopin.

I need to look up, again, the pianist for the Naxos set of Prokofiev's complete symphonies and concertos, I can't remember his/her name, but they were very good. And I need to find the gentlemen that performed the complete set of piano sonatas I have.

Horowitz was amazing, loved his Rachmaninoff.

Richter was fantastic on the Prokofiev sonatas (especially his debut).

I have to agree on both those accounts.

I find Richter very often steamrolls over subtleties in the music. With Prokofiev, this is not as much of a problem, simply because it is often so aggressive and electric. But I found his Beethoven cello sonatas with Rostropovich a bit underwhelming. As a virtuoso, though: he was unstoppable.

Horowitz is usually very good. He sometimes loses it for a moment, though. Tends to go over the top once in a while. He knew Rachmaninov, or at least had met him. I'm not surprised his interpretation is better for that.

For virtuosity, you can't beat Yevgeniy Kissin or Valentina Lisitsa. But neither of those (especially Lisitsa) really has the interpretational or emotional flexibility and greatness of the old masters. I haven't yet found a pianist who does.

Ashkenazy, Horowitz, Maria Joao Pires...

• John Taylor
  
• Keith Jarrett
  
• Thelonious Monk
  
• Carla Bley
  
• Cecil Taylor
  
• Herbie Hancock
  
• Chick Corea
  
• Bill Evans
  

Some folks, likely outside your scope, of whom you all should be aware.

...

Have you guys forgotten Claudio Arrau? His performances of the Beethoven Sonatas are by the far the best. He plays with such a natural, musical feel - nothing is forced or "over-the-top" and his music is so alive.

Horowitz is good too. On YouTube there's a thing of him playing Vers la Flamme by Scriabin and its really good. He builds it really nicely.

Others are Alfred Brendel, Glenn Gould.

There aren't a whole lot of good pianists around these days. Lang Lang and that whole Chinese and Japanese school is techniquely superb but they play the music without any feeling. Honestly, I find it repulsive. Oh well, that's what CD's are for I guess.

One of my favorite pianists is unfortunately not very famous.

Craig Sheppard.

He plays Bach ridiculously well. I heard him play both books from the well tempered clavier. :w00t:

And all of the Chopin polonaises. :o

Which were also amazing by the way.

Glenn Gould does bach and beethoven very very well. His mozart should die though.

Horowitz: One of the greatest pianists ever to have lived. No one played Rachmaninoff like him.

Jeno Jando for Liszt and Chopin.

Oh, and Thelonious Monk. Anybody heard his album, "Monk Alone"?

I'm so stupid! Prokofiev! I have a 1932 and a 1935 recording of him playing his 3rd piano concerto, selections from Visions Fugitives, Suggestions Diabolique, Gavotte from the 1st symphony, the 3rd piano sonata, and more.

I also have Rachmaninoff playing his 2nd and 3rd concertos...

Arthur Rubenstein

Horowitz.

Greg Anderson:

Glenn Gould - Bach

Artur Rubinstein, Martha Argerich - Chopin

Wilhelm Kempff, Claudio Arrau - Beethoven

Vladimir Horowitz, Vladimir Ashkenazy - Rachmaninoff

:P

Glenn Gould and of course Bill Evans, love his playing on 'A Kind of Blue'

Arturo Benedetti Michaelangeli,

Maurizio Pollini,

Krystian Zimerman

Murray Perahia.

I love his Chopin Etudes, Beethoven Piano Concerti, etc.

1. Richard Goode - For Bach and Mozart

2. Jeno Jando - For Mozart (especially Piano Cto. 20)

3. Murray Perahia - For Mozart, Chopin, Beethoven

4. Vladimir Ashkenazy - Mozart, etc.

5. Maria Joao Pires - For Mozart

6. Alexei Nasedkin - For Beethoven (especially Pathetique)

7. Annie Fischer - For Mozart (Cto. 22)

Angela Hewitt, Pierre Laurent-Aimard, Krystian Zimmerman, Alfred Brendel, Richard Goode, also I attended a recital by a young pianist named Joyce Yang (van cliburn silver medalist - she's my age too which blows me away) and it was simply the best piano recital I've ever heard - I heard several recitals in NYC at Carnegie Hall but they didn't compare at all to hers which was given in little old Bartlesville, OK!

Ron Jeremy.

Seriously, though, I dig Gould probably more than anybody else. That said, my knowledge of pianists is very little, much like my pianist is.