Customer Reviews

Complete Piano Music

5 star:		(3)
4 star:		(1)
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No-one with the slightest interest in Chopin should miss Idil Birets recordings of his complete works. There are a few minor disappointments (notably the Waltzes and the Concertos), but most of these interpretations rank with the finest available, and Biret plays with a freshness of approach that sheds new light on this wonderful music. Even those who think they live happily with Pollini, Ashkenazy etc., should check this out. You might be surprised! The piano-sound is slightly to the bright and thin side, but enjoyable enough.

Idil biret's Chopin recordings first released in 1991/92 received very favourable reviews. The eminent musicologist Henry Louis de La Grange wrote in Le Nouvel Observateur in France "Idil Biret, this great pianist is playing Chopin in its entirety in a breathtaking interpretation. One could not imagine that the Ballades, Preludes, Sonatas, Scherzi, Polonaises,Nocturnes, Mazurkas and the Concertos would today find and interpreter of this dimension". Germany's most important music critic Joachim Kaiser writing in the Bunte Magazine put Biret's interpretation of Chopin among the best available versions. In the US, Igor Kipnis wrote in Stereophile that Biret's complete Chopin edition stood among the highest echelons of contemporary Chopin playing. The readers of the Classic CD magazine in the United Kingdom selected Biret's Chopin preludes among the best recordings of 1993. In 1995 Biret's complete editon received in Poland a "Grand Prix du Disque Frederic Chopin" awarded once in every five years (there were 46 entries that year and two were given prizes).

This 15-CD set, covering all of Chopin's piano solo music, is the only complete set out there, and at a bargain price, it is one of the best sets out there that everyone should have.

Some of the playing and interpretations are controversial, such as the lack of noticable dynamics in the nocturnes and other pieces. However, overall, the quality and the price is hard to beat.

Biret is a world-class pianist, with lots of experience. While this set doesn't bring out all of Chopin's character, it is still a new view of Chopin to many pianists out there, and for the price, it is a must-have for everyone out there/

I really enjoyed listening to Biret's approach of chopin on these 15 discs. I have heard other pianists play and i personally find every one of them comparable and each have their own pros and cons. The price of this influenced me over the grammophon's boxset.