"Richter signifies the highest stage in search of musical truth…," this is what the prominent Italian conductor Riccardo Muti said about him.
The scope of performing and, even broader, creative aspirations of the great musician was all-embracing. For almost half a century and for most of the listeners of this country and in many countries worldwide, Sviatoslav Richter's art was not only an example of an extraordinary creative individuality, but also a supreme standard of complete, sacrificial service to art.
This disc features some of the brightest pages of Richter's performances he left on numerous studio and live recordings. Tchaikovsky's Piano Concerto No. 1 and Rachmaninoff's Concerto No. 2 are now part of any performing pianist's repertoire. However, among a great number of outstanding, talented and simply interesting interpretations of the past and present, we always unmistakably recognize Richter's style for its embossed, sculptural modelling of music images, for a multitude of subtle shades of piano sound from powerful symphonicity to a most delicate pianissimo, and finally for inconceivable harmony of a firm rhythmic will and improvisational freedom of motion.
The recordings of Tchaikovsky's piano concertos were made in 1959, at the time when the artist achieved genuine artistic maturity and when the Soviet performing arts saw a new heyday after the first International Tchaikovsky Competition.
