EPTI've been listening to Mendelssohn and Chopin and I thought I'd share recordings I favor. Sometimes people ask me for (classical) music piece recommendations, and in my head I am always thinking "but you have to listen to the right recording!"
With all music, but specially with Chopin, who is popular and widely recorded, the differences in interpretations are extreme. The exception is Bach and some other older composers, where tradition and notions of "correct ways of playing" are too strong. With them, differences are more nuanced, and the recordings that differ are by performers who are known to take a lot of liberty with everything.
In recent decades (or perhaps it's always been this way), the most successful artists are actually those who don't play "correctly," and through their musicianship and power of soul the interpretations become compositions themselves, as it were. Notable examples are Vladimir Horowitz and Lang Lang, and you'll notice that these most mainstream pianists engender a lot of both love and hate--they play too freely, they take too many liberties.
Which makes them outstanding in Chopin, whose music is so lyrical. They know how to sing. This inspiration in my opinion comes from God. Ashkenazy, who recorded all of Chopin's piano works, has flawless technique and plays all the notes and markings. But I think it's mostly trash, and we still prefer hissy, rejected Horowitz takes that are messy.
Anyway yada yada
horowitz chopin ballade #4
if you compare with other recordings, you'll find he plays "too fast"
lang lang Chopin Etude Op.10 No.3 in E Major
if you compare with other recordings, you'll find he plays "too slow" and then in the B section way "too fast"
barenboim Mendelssohn Songs Without Words Op.67 no.2 in F sharp Minor
Horowitz Chopin Etude Op 25 No 5 E minor
