These fascinating and deeply personal performances first appeared between 1966 and 1969 on America's Connoisseur label; they are now finely remastered by VAI, who fully capture this pianist's subtle and lucid sound-world. His imaginative freedom throughout is complemented by a scrupulous concern for the score, an enviable blend supported by the sort of pianistic cunning known to very few players. You may argue about this or that, but time and again you will find yourself returning to square one to reconsider four of Chopin's greatest masterpieces in so many different lights, from so many arresting angles. From Moravec the First Ballade's chief subject is given all the time in the world to tell its despondent tale and scarcely a bar goes by without some intriguing aside. On the other hand he locates an ideal pastoral calm for the Second Ballade's opening, quite without recourse to overblown detailing, and the ensuing storms and hell-bent coda blaze with a magnificently controlled fury. Again, in the final and glorious Fourth Ballade Moravec stretches interpretative parameters close to their limit, yet his performance is far too serious and committed to be thought capricious or attention-seeking.
Superficial is, perhaps, the last word to describe Moravec's way with the Mazurkas. Once more he is gloriously sensitive to their confessional nature, to their volatile flashes of melancholy, fitful radiance and sudden anger. In the A minor work, Op. 17 No. 4 he recreates a desolation with such skill and finesse as to suggest music which reaches its ultimate apotheosis in, say, Debussy's ''Des pas sur la neige''. So, here are riches indeed. The playing of this great and most unusual pianist has always been known to the musical cognoscenti, but this record should help to place him more fully on the map.'