For many Chopin lovers, Arthur Rubinstein’s 1930s recordings of the Polonaises are the benchmark (far preferable to his sonically inferior 1950s remakes); for others, Pollini’s traversal in the 1970s is the ideal; I’ve long had a soft spot for Alexander Brailowsky’s complete 1961 run that includes the early and Op posth Polonaises (Sony, 6/62^R – nla). But I think we all might agree on a new benchmark with the arrival of this recording from Rafa Blechacz. It is not just the nobility and imperiousness of these works that he captures so well, nor the different narrative tones of the seven Polonaises (each separated by 15 seconds of silence), but also the phrasing of a great singer and the moments of heart-wrenching grief. Listen to the return of the main theme at the end of the C minor Polonaise and you’ll see what I mean.

It is a rare intégrale in which every work is as technically successful and musically convincing as all its companions. Only two slight oddities caught my attention: towards the end of those fierce repetitions in Op 44, Blechacz omits some of the demisemiquaver A flat up beats (Rubinstein does the same); and in Op 53 he inserts a small but distracting tenuto three bars before the end of the left-hand octave section. But this is Chopin-playing of the highest order, with recorded piano sound that far surpasses the earlier versions.