Download or listen to the best albums and artists of Solo Piano

Through his “brilliance and maturity” (as described by The Guardian) the Russian-Lithuanian pianist Lukas Geniušas has established himself on the international scene as one of the most interesting artists of his generation. He has appeared in London's Wigmore Hall, Amsterdam's Concertgebouw, Milan's Salle Verdi, Moscow's Conservatory and Roque d'Anthéron, and with orchestras such as the Philharmonique de Radio France, the National de Lyon, the NHK of Tokyo, the Saint Petersburg Philharmonic, the Russian National Orchestra, the list goes on... He has chosen here a Prokofiev programme combining early works from his younger years (the Ten Pieces Op. 12 which is a junior work and yet so intimately prokofievian already!) with the work from his first stage of maturity (Second Sonata from 1912) and the work from his full maturity (the Fifth Sonata). Even better, this Fifth Sonata was written "for the first time" in 1923 after his time in Paris, then revised three decades later under the constraint, undoubtedly, of the infamous Jdanov decree which had accused the composer of all anti-Soviet evils, but also due to a very personal concern (he wanted to purify the piano gesture). In a way this work seems almost "Parisian" as it has so many similarities with Poulenc's style. © SM/Qobuz

When thinking of the great German pianist Wilhelm Backhaus, the image of an old master with a large pale forehead often comes to mind, frozen in his somewhat wise and austere performances. With his fierce young Beethoven-like appearance, Backhaus gave his first recital in 1899 while his last concert, by which time he was a respectable old man, took place on July 5 1969, a week before his death. The miraculous advances in recording preserved this brilliant seventy-year-long career, because, unlike his colleagues Rubinstein and Schnabel who shied away from vinyl, Backhaus was one of the pioneers of the medium, having made his first records in 1908. Created for His Master’s Voice (HMV) between 1925 and 1935 and carefully restored here, these recordings are mainly devoted to Chopin (with the first complete recording of the Études), Liszt and Schumann. In addition, the second part is reserved for the transcriptions that were popular in those distant times. While the young Backhaus’ technique is breathtaking, it also teaches us something about musical history. Styles of playing change over the years and no one today would dare to play at such a dizzying speed. It was after the Second World War that pianists became a little more relaxed and began to abandon the sacred "short pieces" to play Beethoven's or Schubert's great sonatas, finding more gravity in keeping with the spirit of the times. The tempos slowed down significantly while the invention of the microgroove made it possible to capture long pieces of music, more favourable to the outpouring of expression than the 78-rpm sides allowed. It is truly touching to return to these recordings that symbolise a world that was lost forever. © François Hudry/Qobuz

Pianist Igor Levit moved from Russia to Germany when he was eight, but there's still a lot of Russian in his outlook: an attraction to the pure virtuoso tradition, and a tendency toward big statements and the big questions. Nowhere has this been more true than on Life, an album that succeeds both thematically and as a thrilling embodiment of late-Romantic pianism at its best. The title, and the contents, refer to the album's memorial function: Levit chose the program to honor a close artist friend who died in an accident. The music is monumental enough to live up to its death-haunted theme, rising out of silence in the Fantasia after J.S. Bach of Busoni and continuing with a remarkably sustained mood of soberness and dignity, punctuated by frenetic outbursts. Busoni is one major presence on the program; the other is Liszt, and the two come together in the Busoni transcription of the Fantasy and Fugue on the Chorale Ad nos, ad salutarem undam of Liszt, originally for organ and an impressive virtuoso task on the piano. So the program works well also as a revival of pure late-Romantic pianism: you can easily imagine that Liszt would have loved this, and loved to play it. A third theme interweaving the works on the program is that of reinterpretation, as in the Brahms transcription of the Chaconne from the Bach Partita for solo violin in D minor, BWV 1004; the fact that Levit has played these works in different orderings in recital testifies to the program's remarkable cohesiveness. There is music by Frederic Rzewski in a memorial vein, and Bill Evans' serene Peace Piece is a lovely conclusion. Bravo!

A century after his death on 25 March 1918, many harmonia mundi artists are eager to pay tribute to Claude Debussy, the magician of melody and timbre, the great 'colourist' and father of modern music. After Rachmaninoff's Preludes, Nikolai Lugansky wanted to present a finely nuanced portrait of this composer so fond of travelling! Whether it ranges over time (Hommage à Haydn) or the most vividly imagined open spaces, this freely composed programme is concerned above all with light and colour, in works we can never tire of. © harmonia mundi

Considered as one of the most inspired pianists of his generation, Severin von Eckardstein explores three major cycles of French music from the 1900s, associating Claude Debussy’s two revolutionary books Images (1904-1907) and Gabriel Dupont’s La Maison dans les dunes (1907-1909) as part of this debut album under the Artalinna label: this suite of 10 pieces with memorable atmospheres filled with luminous colours and heady melodies will stand out for many as a musical revelation! © Artalinna

« The title does not lie: it is really "the art" of the Italian master who shines in this box, [...] showing the artist in a surprising form when he was already nearly eighty years old. [...] A rich complement to the sum published in 2009 by Warner. » (Translated from French – Diapason, janvier 2019 / Bertrand Boissard)

Valentina Toth: “Although they were not musically trained, my parents taught me to love Bartók and Kodály. I treasured their music from the time I was young, and only became acquainted with Dohnányi’s work much later, when I came in contact with it by accident. It was romantic, virtuoso and incredibly well written for the instrument. What more can you ask as a concert pianist? And although he may only seem rather less distinctly Hungarian than Bartók, many aspects of his country are reflected in his work. I remember when I was working on the Ruralia hungarica, my father recognised many of the melodies from the songs he had learned as a boy.” As a composer, Dohnányi, whose oeuvre mainly consists of piano music, deep in his heart always remained a musician grounded in nineteenth-century Romanticism. Dohnányi wrote Ruralia hungarica in 1923 and gave it a real Hungarian touch by including a wide range of folk melodies in all movements. The Humoresken Op. 17 from 1907 date from when he taught in Berlin. They are basically romantic in nature and now and then reminiscent of Brahms’s piano music. As the name suggests, these are more or less light-hearted character pieces, in which he draws on musical forms from the eighteenth century. © SM/Qobuz

Music has been described as a way of saving that which has been lost: a simple but strong idea, and one which has influenced Hélène Grimaud's artistic expression.Her new album Memory deals with music's power to bring back to life the images of the past in the present, its ability to vividly and piercingly evoke a specific time and a place. It explores the essence of memory through a series of refined miniatures for piano. The choice of repertoire covers a vast, diverse range, from the reveries of Chopin and Debussy to the timeless, folky melodies of Valentin Silvestrov.  © Universal