Although Moritz Moszkowski (1854–1925) wrote a considerable quantity of piano music, only a single piece, ‘Étincelles’, made it into the repertoire, not least because Horowitz enjoyed playing it. The early works on this second instalment in Ian Hobson’s survey of Moszkowski’s complete music for solo piano reveal a debt to Mendelssohn and Schumann, but the effortless craftsmanship to be heard here already justifies a later remark of Paderewski’s: ‘After Chopin, Moszkowski best understands how to write for the piano, and his writing embraces the whole gamut of piano technique’. Most of the pieces in opp. 15 and 18 are attractive salon miniatures, but the Three Piano Pieces in Dance Form, op.17, are extended Lisztian essays that showcase Moszkowski’s mastery of the keyboard and his command of form.

“Hobson and the superb, Warsaw-based Sinfonia Varsovia […] give us an outstanding performance of another, long forgotten, orchestral work. […] the bass [is] clean and goes down to rock bottom with some seismic, bass drum thumps that will exercise your woofers. This CD will […] leave ardent romanticists anxiously awaiting Toccata's next volume in this series.” – Classical Lost and Found, Feb 2020 (TOCC0523: Moszkowski - Orchestral Music Vol.1)