At one or two moments during the Nocturnes and the Pieces breves the piano sound on these CDs takes on a quality that I had not noticed on LP. It is very slight, will probably strike many listeners as unimportant and is rather hard to describe: I would compare it to the rather grainy feel of dust on a polished surface, I see that my notes also describe it as 'chalky'. If the other matter about which I have a reservation can be described as a 'fault' then it is a fault of Crossley's very considerable qualities. He approaches Faure's piano music with a blazing conviction of its underestimated greatness and an acute understanding of its elusive individuality. He recognizes the true stature of pieces that can so easily be made to sound like miniatures, and is so intent on demonstrating what big music they are that, for my taste, he occasionally gives them readings that are too big. Sometimes literally, with textures that I find too rich, with accents stabbed too transportedly, sometimes it is a question of the music's emotional burden being conveyed with an excess of expressive rubato. It is a measure (paradoxical and ungrateful) of Crossley's eloquent advocacy that his playing carries total conviction but at times makes this listener, at least, long for readings that do not insist quite so much.
Crossley is, however at his very best when Faure is at his most challenging: such things as the almost inarticulately intense Ninth Nocturne, the sombre Tenth (a really big piece, played with great subtlety and eloquence), the elegiac, 'Venetian' Ninth Barcarolle—the exquisitely luminous later Barcarolles, in fact, are uniformly successful in their beautiful sonority and their understanding of the range of Faure's aqueous metaphors. The Eleventh and Thirteenth Nocturnes are very fine, too, in their progression from poignancy to bitter protest, each with a characteristic transformation of mood in the coda: Crossley's perceptive handling of Faure's codas is another of his great strengths. Indeed, I almost wish now that I had not mentioned my reservations, but although I have listened to these performances with growing enjoyment and respect since they were first issued those reservations have refused to diminish. They may well seem trivial to other listeners.'