Piers Lane brings his admired technical bravura and innate musicality to Scriabin’s Complete Études.

To listen to the complete Études as presented on this album is to hear the gradual but total transformation from within of Scriabin’s musical language, from the earliest significant compositions to the final period. He began with a richly romantic and strongly emotional style centred on Chopin. After 1900 the texture and rhythmic structure of the music became increasingly intricate and fluid, while his sense of form grew ever more focused and concentrated. This provided the necessary balance to the overwhelmingly expressionistic, often erotic, urge in the musical material.

‘Piers Lane is easily up to tackling the volatile figures that abound in Scriabin’s piano music. Indeed, his technical bravura is often breathtaking … thankfully Lane never lets us forget that the virtuosic and poetic exist in equal measure’ - BBC Music Magazine Top 1000 CDs Guide

‘Such virtuosity … deserves engineering of a high calibre and here we get it. Quite extraordinary clarity and wide-ranging tonal fidelity in a spacious recording which places the listener at an ideal distance in a warmly welcoming acoustic setting’ - Gramophone

‘All the fiendish technical demands are well in his grasp, and his keen musical intelligence and finely discriminating ear do the rest’ - BBC Record Review

[from CDA66607]