Sunday, June 17, 2012

Frédéric Chopin: Complete Works, 100 Pianists

In this playlist, you get the complete works of Frédéric Chopin recorded by 100 pianists. Most are outstanding performances from the stereo era, including such great Chopin interpreters as Martha Argerich, Claudio Arrau, Vladimir Ashkenazy, Daniel Barenboim, Jorge Bolet, Shura Cherkassky, Nelson Freire, Andrei Gavrilov, Vladimir Horowitz, Evgeny Kissin, Arturo Benedetti Michelangeli, Murray Perahia, Maurizio Pollini, Arthur Rubinstein, Mitsuko Uchida, Earl Wild, Krystian Zimerman, and many more. I also put in a few important historical recordings by Alfred Cortot, Dinu Lipatti and Samson Francois. All winners of the International Chopin Piano Competition are included, except Yakov Zak and the 2010 winner Yulianna Avdeeva.


This playlist can be used as an index of great pianists on Spotify. I only selected from recordings that are available on both Spotify UK and US, so William Kapell's recording of the Mazurkas (Spotify UK only) is not included. As for Lang Lang, personally I dislike almost every recording he made, except for the Chopin concertos (no.2 is featured here).

Get this collection in one Spotify playlist: Frédéric Chopin: Complete Works by 100 Pianists (268 tracks, total time: 19 hours) Ctrl (CMD) + G to browse in album view. Works are sorted by opus number and year of publication, as listed here. Do not play from the start, the op.1 rondo composed by a teenage Chopin is not much of a good opening track. Put this playlist on shuffle for Radio Chopin, or use Ctrl (CMD) + F to search for Nocturnes, Mazurkas, Preludes etc. Also check out the 4-hour audiobook Life & Works of Chopin in Naxos Educational.

A list of pianists in this playlist, with Spotify links.
Posted by ulyssestone at 9:21 AM
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