# Musicians you do like!



## KaerbEmEvig

In opposition to the thread entitled "musicians you don't like". What are the musicians you like - or even love? Name as many as you want, say what they specialise in. They can be very well known or completely unknown.

I'll start with Marijana Mijanovic. Lovely contralto. And that fury!


----------



## Meaghan

Richard Stoltzman: superhuman cross-genre clarinetist and champion of new music


----------



## Olias

All of these people I have met personally, and they are as kind and friendly to their admirers as they are amazing musicians:

Alisa Weilerstein - cello
Hilary Hahn - violin
Eric Ruske - horn
Alison Balsom - trumpet
Andre Watts - piano


----------



## Grosse Fugue

Mezzo soprano Joyce Didonato-singers are musicians too


























Do not miss these last two











Florence Jenkins for pure comic value-People loved her because she was so bad, she even sang at Carnegie Hall


----------



## Art Rock

Dawn Upshaw
Anne-Sofie von Otter
Dietrich Fischer Dieskau
Kronos Quartet


----------



## Aksel

Christian Lindberg
Martin Fröst
John Lill

Joyce DiDonato
Cecilia Bartoli
Philippe Jaroussky
Patricia Petibon
I fagiolini
Kirsten Flagstad


----------



## Weston

Wendy Carlos. I don't know her but she is quite a chatterbox on some of her CD's and web page. A charming human being. A fantastic composer as well.


----------



## Chi_townPhilly

I appreciate the very open-ended idea of "like." Taking it in a more subjective direction, it doesn't necessarily mean the greatest artists, nor always the artists who are behind your favorite renditions.

Piano- Josef Hofmann. We don't see his like any more.

Violin- (here's a surprise) Shmuel Ashkenasi. We'll never know what kind of solo career he could have put together had he inclined in that direction... but he instead went the way of being part of the team for the Vermeer Quartet.

Cello- Jacqueline du Pré, because I just can't help myself.


----------



## Leonid Kogan

Leonid Kogan- not me, the Soviet violinist
Martha Argerich
Richter


----------



## fresk

Eric Ruske - horn
and in these modern Enrique is my favorite.


----------



## JSK

Joshua Bell - Because he's such a poser!


----------



## zoziejemaar

Khatia Buniatishvili - a gorgeous -- well, really gorgeous -- Georgian pianist


----------



## jhar26




----------



## KaerbEmEvig

jhar26 said:


>


Damn, who would have thought.


----------



## Webernite

Sviatoslav Richter, Glenn Gould, Emil Gilels, Artur Schnabel, Claudio Arrau, Charles Rosen, Trevor Pinnock, Gustav Leonhardt, Yehudi Menuhin, Arthur Grumiaux, Henryk Szeryng, Hilary Hahn, Pierre Boulez, many others...


----------



## jhar26

KaerbEmEvig said:


> Damn, who would have thought.


Yep, I'm full of surprises.


----------



## MrTortoise

George Solti (rip) and Christoph Eschenbach are two of my favorite musical personalities.


----------



## Huilunsoittaja

Emmanuel Pahud - Flute 
James Galway - Flute
Flutists from older generations - Baker, Kincaid, Mariano

Richter - Piano
Argerich - Piano


----------



## science

I appreciate Yo-Yo Ma, Joshua Bell, the Kronos Quartet, Gideon Kremer, Andre Previn and others who risk their credibility with the mainstream classical music market in order to record odd things and reach new listeners.


----------



## Barking Spiderz

#1 for me is Alison Balsom. heard her playing some Vivaldi and knocked me senseless so she did. Damn fine looking woman as well as a superb trumpet player
#2 Kyung Wha Chung - she's tremendous and my player of choice when seeking out violin concertos. And none too shabby looking either
#3 damn, not a lady but none other than Jascha Heifetz. No explanation needed really.
#4 Nelson Freire - it was the Brahms piano concertos with Chailly that sold me. Seminal work or what
#5 Murray Perahia - his Beethoven piano concertos are enough to warrant favouritism

As for conductors I have several clear faves whose names will get me investigating whatever they do;
David Zinman, Riccardo Chailly, Claudio Abbado, Bernard Haitink, Maris Janssons, Osmo Vanksa, Neeme Jarvi, Sir Thomas Beecham, Vasily Petrenko, Sir Neville Marriner and Antal Dorati


----------



## dandylion

Jascha Haifetz
Krystian Zimerman
Andre Rieu
Ivan Rebroff

The last two for their entertainment value. In defense of Andre Rieu, he brings such energy and delight to thousands of people who might not be true classical music fans. The crowds enthusiam reminds me of my days in the German gunclub and winefests.


----------



## Tschaikowsky

Van Cliburn
Heifetz
Rachmaninoff
Alexei Sultanov
Nobuyuki Tsujii
Toscanini
Arrau
Abbado
Yo Yo Ma


----------



## mamascarlatti

Antonio Pappano for Opera Italia
Joyce DiDonato (mezzo) for her warm-hearted blog
Jennifer Rivera (mezzo) for her funny blog
Anna Netrebko for her joie de vivre
Andrew Richards (tenor) for exploring the creative process so honestly in his blog
Jonas Kaufmann for his intelligence and great acting
Plácido Domingo for his energy and charm


----------



## Il Seraglio

Listes by category, my absolute favourites are in bold.

Keyboardists:
*Sviatoslav Richter*
Dinu Lipatti
Martha Argerich
Jos van Immerseel
Vladimir Horowitz
Sophie Yates
Imogen Cooper

Singers:
Maria Callas
Joan Sutherland
*Bernada Fink*
Alexandrina Pendatchanska
Richard Croft
*Fritz Wunderlich*
Bryn Terfel
*Renee Fleming*
Cecilia Bartoli (when she isn't miscast)
Fritz Wunderlich
Lucia Popp
Placido Domingo
Patricia Petibon
Topi Lehtipuu

Strings:
*Nathan Milstein*
Aaron Rosand
Chiara Banchini
Mstislav Rostropovich
Pierre Fournier

Conductors:
*Carlos Kleiber*
Arturo Toscanini
Otto Klemperer
William Christie
Rene Jacobs
Ton Koopman
*Phillipe Herreweghe*
Rinaldo Alessandrini

Orchestras:
Akademie für Alte Musik Berlin
Freiburger Barockorchester
Wien Philharmoniker
Berlin Philharmoniker
London Symphony Orchestra
Cologne Radio Symphony Orchestra

Ensembles (including string ensembles):
*Gabrieli Consort*
Ensemble 415
Les Arts Florissants
Concerto Koln
Concerto Italiano
Quartetto Italiano
Quatuor Mosaiques
Amadeus Quartet
Deller Consort
Tallis Scholars


----------



## lokomotiv

leonid kogan all the way!


----------



## graaf

Carlos Kleiber, Sergiu Celibidache, Valery Gergiev, Herbert von Karajan, Leonard Bernstein, Anne Sophie Mutter, Maxim Vengerov, Martha Argerich, Ivo Pogorelic, Vladimir Ashkenazy, Anna Netrebko...

PS
Interesting how much shorter is this thread, compared to "Musicians you dislike".


----------



## kv466

Isao Tomita and Don Dorsey


----------



## Moscow-Mahler

I like Isabell Faust!


----------



## violadude

One of my favorite singers is Thomas Quasthoff. He has a really beautiful deep voice and it is so expressive too! I have his recording of Schubert's Winterreise and it's amazing!


----------



## Sid James

I'll just mention some Australian musicians who I've seen live in concert over the years -

Stuart Challender, Charles Mackerras - two of our greatest conductors, now sadly passed away, but their memory will live on
Carl Pini, Richard Tognetti - violinists, and leaders of the Australian Chamber Orchestra (one former, the other current)
Kathryn Selby - pianist, leader of the piano trio group called "Trioz" - my favourite group to see live in recital, they have introduced me to many gems of this repertoire
Julian Smiles, Emma Jane Murphy - cellists, the former part of the Goldner String Quartet, one of our finest, the latter a member of Trioz
Georg Pedersen - another cellist, a lecturer at Sydney Conservatorium, where he appears in many interesting recitals
Sarah Grace Williams - chief conductor of the Metropolitan Orchestra of Sydney, she has conducted the major orchestras of this country, an amazing musician all-round
Anthony Pasquill - conductor, in his twenties, he specialises in choral repertoire (recently saw him conduct Haydn's The Creation & it was like the concert of my life!)
Stephanie McCallum - one of our finest pianists, one of the best of the Southern Hemisphere
Brett Dean, Peter Sculthorpe, Matthew Hindson, Barry Conyngham, Nigel Butterley, Ann Boyd - some of my favourite composers from "Down Under"
Roger Dean - our best in the electronic realm - composer-improviser; keyboards, computers; arts researcher; founder and director of LYSIS and austraLYSIS
Tommy Tycho - multi-talented Hungarian-born Australian pianist, conductor, composer and arranger
Paul Dyer - leader of the Australian Brandenburg Orchestra

@ dandylion - agree about Andre Rieu, nice to have another fan of him on this forum...


----------



## mamascarlatti

The more I see and hear Dawn Upshaw the more I admire her. She always shows full commitment, she's versatile (Handel to Saariaho) and is willing to explore new challenges.


----------



## Sofronitsky

mamascarlatti said:


> The more I see and hear Dawn Upshaw the more I admire her. She always shows full commitment, she's versatile (Handel to Saariaho) and is willing to explore new challenges.


Thanks for the recommendation! I heard her sing Debussy and was entranced.

As for me, I like (piano):
*Sofronitsky (hehe)* (His Beethoven, Chopin, and Rachmaninoff is incredible and always interesting. His Scriabin is unmatchable.)
*Hofmann * (Titanic playing, although not well represented in some recordings. Best technique of any pianist I've heard.)
*Richter * (My favorite  )

for Conductors I like Kleiber and Dutoit quite alot.


----------



## GoneBaroque

Weston said:


> Wendy Carlos. I don't know her but she is quite a chatterbox on some of her CD's and web page. A charming human being. A fantastic composer as well.


It seems that no one as replied with information on Wendy Carlos, who was born in Rhode Island in 1939 as Walter Carlos, began living as a woman in 1968, I believe, and underwent a sex change operation in the early 1970's. she is also a noted photographer. Still alive as far as I know.

Rob


----------



## serinia

I really like Anna Moffo. She had a beautiful lyric coloratura voice.


----------



## World Violist

Jean-Efflam Bavouzet: He lets music speak clearly, with charm and without clutter, and I don't hear that from many pianists.

Paavo Jarvi: He's been sorta off and on with me, but now I think he's really coming into his own. His recent Bruckner and Mahler are excellent, and I feel like there's an element of risk, danger, something like that which I hadn't heard from him before, and which I felt was the only thing missing for him. So now he's climbing up on my list of favorite conductors.


----------



## Il_Penseroso

Well, They are so many ... 
*Joan Sutherland*
Just a little compare with fully fashionized contemporary sopranos like Anna Netrebko is enough ...


----------



## regressivetransphobe

NONE of THEMMMM


----------



## Philip

Shin-Ichi Fukuda, guitarist


----------



## Il_Penseroso

*Carlo Maria Giulini*, for he recorded famous Italian Operas and many other works sometimes in the best possible way you can ever imagine, and for his calm and patient method he used to conduct the orchestra, also his personality. Despite many of his contemporaries he was only a conductor, not a showman as well ...


----------



## Il_Penseroso

*Albert Schweitzer*, Musician (Organist), Philosopher, Physician ... great personality ... a man rarely born in a century.


----------



## Il_Penseroso

*Kathleen Ferrier*, holy voice , but a tragic death that was too early for her ...


----------



## Sid James

Two great musicians from Spain, the pianist *Alicia de Larrocha* & the singer *Victoria de los Angeles*:


----------



## Il_Penseroso

Famous Soprano, *Leontyne Price* : One of the most beautiful voices in the history of opera ! A great arstist with a great personality !


----------



## World Violist

Christoph von Dohnanyi: A master of plain-spoken and still meaningful conducting.

Christine Schafer: Gorgeous voice, wonderful musician.

Andreas Scholl: Simply the most pure, unfettered, innocent voice one could imagine. And such wonderful phrasing!


----------



## Meaghan

Il_Penseroso said:


>


Why is his baton glowing? (He kind of looks like he is wondering the same thing.) Is it actually a magic wand?


----------



## GoneBaroque

Meaghan said:


> Why is his baton glowing? (He kind of looks like he is wondering the same thing.) Is it actually a magic wand?


That is for conducting Dark Music.

Rob


----------



## Il_Penseroso

*Natalia Makarova*, Russian born eminent ballerina, just for her dancing as Odette/Odile in Covent Garden's 1982 production of Swan Lake, I give everything !


----------



## saxy

Here are some of my favorite classical saxophonists:

Sigurd Rascher
Marcel Mule
Eugene Rousseau
Kenneth Tse
Harry-Kinross White
Otis Murphy
Claude Delangle


----------



## Klavierspieler

I'm surprised that nobody mentioned *Artur Rubinstein*, I love his Chopin.
Others include:
*Krystian Zimermann*, love his Chopin too.
*András Schiff*, my favorite Beethoven interpreter, though I can't stand his Bach.
*Sviatoslav Richter* for Schumann.


----------



## Vesteralen

Cynthia Koledo DeAlmeida - Principal Oboist - Pittsburgh Symphony Orchestra

I was blown away by her lovely tone in a recent performance of Brahms Fourth Symphony under Manfred Honeck. So impressed I went online and purchased her two solo CDs.


----------



## Il_Penseroso

Ernest Ansermet, one of the best conductors ever lived ... A close friend of Igor Stravinsky, gave premiere of a couple of his works , one the best interpretators of his compositions (according to Stravinksy himself), but later a critic of his music !


----------



## Sid James

*@ Il Penseroso* - Also quite a big Ansermet fan here. Been collecting some of his classic recordings on Australian Eloquence recently. He can be a bit detached, but I like that in a way, he focuses on the music at hand with a degree of impartiality, rather than using it as a vehicle to stroke his ego. Ansermet's far from flamboyant accounts were apparently well liked by the Brits but not as much by the French. Yes, he was an intimate friend of many of the great composers of the time, incl. Stravinsky, also Ravel & Debussy. I think as far as he went into the more modern repertoire was Bartok & I think he did some Nielsen. I don't think he had much time for the "atonalists" like Schoenberg or Berg, but that kind of ideological "turf war" between the "tonal" and "atonal" was a sign of those times, but it's largely over now, a non-issue. In terms of attitude (but not necessarily style), Ansermet liked to collaborate with his fellow musicians, similar to Furtwangler. Ansermet was not a dictator or as difficult to work with as say Toscanini or Mahler. He also established the Suisse Romande Orchestra, and built it up from the ground to be one of the great orchestras of Europe. All in all, this guy gets my seal of approval, for what it's worth...


----------



## Sid James

As for me, in recent years, getting back seriously into classical, I have great respect for the musicians of both today and yesteryear who really made an effort to play BOTH the old & new repertoire. They know that classical music is a living tradition, not a dead one. Musicians like this think outside the box, indeed, I think these guys had/have no concept of boxes. Eg. -

Mstislav Rostropovich, Gregor Piatigorsky, Jean-Guihen Qyeyras- cellists, these guys, esp. the former commissioned many works from contemporary composers of their times, greatly adding to the cello repertoire

Maurizio Pollini, Alfred Brendel, Francesco Tristano, Idil Biret - pianists

Anne-Sophie Mutter, Hilary Hahn, Isaac Stern, Itzhak Perlman - violinists

Jean-Pierre Rampal - flautist

Conductors like Pierre Boulez & Simon Rattle have done a lot of music of the last century or so in particular

In Australia, conductors like Stuart Challender & Hiroyuki Iwaki have done the same (they are no longer with us, but their legacy lives on).

Some of our groups here like the Australian Chamber Orchestra, both under it's former leader Carl Pini and current one Richard Tognetti have continued to present stimulating and engaging programs spanning the whole history of the repertoire, not just the usual "warhorses" from c. 1800-1900. Same with some smaller groups here like the Australia Ensemble, incorporating the Goldner String Quartet, one of our finest. Not to mention other Aussie chamber groups, like the Flinders String Quartet & also the Australian Brandenburg Orchestra, under Paul Dyer, who play a variety of older musics, a lot of it fairly obscure. Geez, there are too many to mention, these guys are doing & have done such a great job...


----------



## Il_Penseroso

@ Sid James - Very glad to see another big Ansermet fan ! Yes, he's exactly as you described, and that's the way I like him. L'Orchestre de la Suisse Romande is still one of the best orchestras in Europe (I have a CD box 'The Essential Stravinsky' the orchestra is counducted by Neeme Järvi and everything sounds extremely good.)



> I don't think he had much time for the "atonalists" like Schoenberg or Berg, but that kind of ideological "turf war" between the "tonal" and "atonal" was a sign of those times, but it's largely over now, a non-issue.


He was a big critic of atonal music, he even once tried to prove that Schoenberg's theory on twelve-tone technique is basically false according to mathematic rules, as he was a mathematics professor at Lausanne university ...


----------



## tdc

An obvious choice but - Sviatoslav Richter. This man has really opened my eyes as to how much difference an interpreter makes in a piece. Listening to the first movement from Debussy's Estampes right now, it is so amazing and its like I had never heard this piece of music before - all though I had. The version I had previously listened to was by Werner Haas...the guy seems competent enough, but he doesn't approach Debussy in a way that suites my tastes... This music needs room to breathe and grow, and it needs an intimate heart-felt approach imo. With certain Debussy pieces this is even more important than the technicalities. Richter is great here in both areas.


----------



## Vesteralen

Sid James said:


> *@ Il Penseroso* - Also quite a big Ansermet fan here. Been collecting some of his classic recordings on Australian Eloquence recently. .


The very first music I taped off FM radio (over 40 years ago) was the Bach Second Violin Concerto with Ansermet conducting and Erica Morini as soloist.








I would love to find a recording of that for old times' sake.

Which brings up my new project: I'm starting to research older female violinists. I see that some of Erica Morini's work has been collected on CD. Reviews of the sound quality on the discs seem a bit mixed, but I'm interested anyway.

And here's another musician I loved, both for her performances and her personality:








Ruth Laredo. We lost her too soon.


----------



## TrazomGangflow

Shoji Tabuchi (violinst, fiddler)
Vladimir Ashkenazy (piano)


----------



## Ronim

Oboe: Camden, Holliger, Wojniwicz (coloratura oboe)
Clarinet: Neidich
Bassoon: Thunemann (coloratura bassoon)
Violin: Grumiaux, Mutter
Cello: Fournier (coloratura cello)
Piano: Gilels, Perahia, Hamelin
Harpsichord: Staier
Organ: Stockmeier
Coloratura soprano: Marshall, Monoyios, Argenta, Kalmar
Bass: Shirley-Quirk


----------



## doctorGwiz

Klavierspieler said:


> *Krystian Zimermann*, love his Chopin too.


I'm a big fan of zimerman too. I found this to be pretty funny:


----------



## Sid James

I must say *Martha Argerich *hasn't been my cup of tea, I thought her playing was unneccessarily too beefed up and on steroids (eg. bashing the piano when there isn't a need). But now she gets my thumbs up, even if only for *Bartok's* _Sonata for Two pianos & percussion _which she put down with Stephen Bishop-Kovacevich. It's just a stunning performance, and the rest of that disc, with works of Mozart and Debussy is also not something that I'd think is easy to put down, for a pianophile or not...



Il_Penseroso said:


> ...as he was a mathematics professor at Lausanne university ...


Thanks for mentioning that, I wasn't aware of that about Maestro Ansermet...


----------



## Ravellian

Although there are many famous pianists I detest (Argerich, Lang Lang, Brendel, etc), I enjoy these pianists quite a lot:

Sviatoslav Richter
John O'Conor
Emil Gilels
Evgeny Kissin
Dinu Lipatti
Vladdy Horowitz
Georges Cziffra
Myself


----------



## Webernite

What do you detest about Argerich?


----------



## Shostakovichiana

I'll go for the classic one, no great shock: Sviatoslav Richter.


----------



## clavichorder

I like Berezovsky for all his work with Medtner. I also really like Hamish Milne for doing complete Medtner. Yevgeny Sudbin is great too. Grigory Sokolov is a fascinating pianist as well.

For classics, I like Giles the most with Richter second.


----------



## myaskovsky2002

Roberto Alagna, Pleasant Sunday (Placido Domingo)

Martin


----------



## myaskovsky2002

Klavierspieler said:


> I'm surprised that nobody mentioned *Artur Rubinstein*, I love his Chopin.
> Others include:
> *Krystian Zimermann*, love his Chopin too.
> *András Schiff*, my favorite Beethoven interpreter, though I can't stand his Bach.
> *Sviatoslav Richter* for Schumann.


Richter is the most! His Scriabin is as good as Sofronitsky....a major piano player not mentioned here.

Martin


----------



## Lunasong

I have more CDs of Eric Ruske (horn) than any other solo artist.


----------



## appoggiatura

Sviatoslav Richter
Bernard Haitink
Leonardo Bernstein 
Nikolai Lugansky 
Severin von Eckardstein 
Janine Jansen
Daniel Barenboim
Valery Gergiev
Herbert von Karajan
Kiri te Kanawa
Emil Gilels
Dietrich Fischer Diskau

And I share myaskovsky2002's thoughts about Placido Domingo and Roberto Alagna.


----------



## Wehwalt

Maria Yudina (Her Beethoven Sonata's are incredibly beautiful  )
Valentina Lisita

Birgit Nilsson 
Wolfgang Windgassen
Hans Hotter
Leonie Rysanek
Dietrich Fischer-Diskau

Georg Solti
Herbert von Karajan

To name a few but there are many more musicians whose work I love


----------



## aphyrodite

I looove Arthur Rubinstein's Chopin. Very well done. And Ashkenazy's Rachmaninoff.


----------



## alandc

Hilary Hahn
Yuja Wang
John Williams


----------



## Elune

There are many musicians who inspire me and I really like. I'll start with my most favourite musician - the great pianist Martha Argerich. For me she is like a Goddess. Emil Gilels, Arthur Rubinstein, Dinu Lipatti, Alfred Cortot, Claudio Abaddo, Gidon Kremer, Anna Netrebko, Yehudi Menuhin and many others ... They all are great and incredible!


----------



## jhar26

Elune said:


> There are many musicians who inspire me and I really like. *I'll start with my most favourite musician - the great pianist Martha Argerich. For me she is like a Goddess.* Emil Gilels, Arthur Rubinstein, Dinu Lipatti, Alfred Cortot, Claudio Abaddo, Gidon Kremer, Anna Netrebko, Yehudi Menuhin and many others ... They all are great and incredible!


I think I'm gonna like you. :tiphat:


----------



## Taneyev

Can't answer this. Mi list would go for hundreds.


----------



## Moira

Odnoposoff suggests that the list would run to hundreds. Relating to all the musicians in the world, I must agree.

I tend to favour live music for my listening time, so I hear a great deal of music which is NOT by 'world' musicians, but rather by South Africans, often local to my city. I have favourites amongst these musicians to a great degree, often based on something other than their musical ability. They might be friends of mine, or have something in common with me other than music, and these 'familiarities' breed favouritism rather than contempt ... well usually. 

The point of this little ramble is that this thread makes me realise just how parochial my understanding of music really is. Which leads to thoughts about what the musical world must have been like before the availability of recordings.


----------



## MaestroViolinist

Itzhak Perlman!!! The best! And David Oistrakh (all violin). Vengerov is good too, and Spivakov.

The best cellist I think was Jacqueline du Pre. 

There is a violist I really like, but the problem is I don't know his name.


----------



## ComposerOfAvantGarde

^his name is Yuri Bashmet


----------



## jani

I like Bernstein, He is a great conductor also he is a great teacher. I have watched lots of videos were he speaks about music.
He has that great skill to explain "Hard" stuff so well that it becomes easier to understand.
Of course i don't agree with everything he says, but i always enjoy listening him when he talks about music.


----------



## Vesteralen

A few more:







Count Basie







Marian Anderson







Nikki Yanofsky







Xuefei Yang


----------



## MaestroViolinist

ComposerOfAvantGarde said:


> ^his name is Yuri Bashmet


Aagrh, you can read minds!  That was who I was thinking of!


----------



## ComposerOfAvantGarde

MaestroViolinist said:


> Aagrh, you can read minds!  That was who I was thinking of!


Told you so!


----------



## MaestroViolinist

ComposerOfAvantGarde said:


> Told you so!


ut: Wish I read minds...  Then again, maybe I don't want to know what goes on in your head! :lol:


----------



## jani

I don't play violin and i don't know much about violin playing but i must say that Maxim Venegrov is a beast!


----------



## halftone

Having gone through the entire list of favorites, I am somewhat distressed that the incredible pianist Valentina Lisitsa was not mentioned. There are a number of astonishing youtube presentations but the ones that stand out are Liszt's Hungarian Rhapsody #2 and another Liszt blockbuster, "Totentanz". Despite her grueling schedule, Ms Lisitsa responded to an e-mail I sent. She is a very
exceptional person. Has anyone else out there seen/heard her?


----------



## Rinaldino

I've a lot of personal favourites among musicians. My very very top are:
Conductors: Giulini, Karajan, Boulez, Klemperer, Jochum
Performers: Aimard, Zimerman, Arrau, the Alban Berg quartet, Rostropovich, Lipatti, Richter, 
Singers: Sutherland, Tebaldi, Horne, Mingardo, Lauri Volpi, Taddei, Talvela, Nilsson, Fischer-Dieskau, Vickers.
Giulini, Lipatti and Tebaldi all my all time favourite artists.


----------



## MaestroViolinist

DANIELLE BELEN! 

Just look at this video: 




And this one:


----------



## Humidor

halftone said:


> Having gone through the entire list of favorites, I am somewhat distressed that the incredible pianist Valentina Lisitsa was not mentioned. Has anyone else out there seen/heard her?


I've seen a lot of her stuff. She's very good with some pieces (Her Liszt Ave Maria is a personal favorite) but I'm still not fully sold. My main issue with her is that I feel like she sometimes has difficulty getting depth out of a piece in satisfying way. For example if you put her Rachmaninoff prelude 5 up against Ritchers or Gilels it crumbles pretty quickly.. I know these are giants but whatever, that's my standard of "incredible"


----------



## Ravndal

Valentina is terrible imo. But if i want to watch a piece being played incredibly fast i check her out.


----------



## EricABQ

I'm not familiar enough with a variety of musicians to make very many judgments, but I know I've never been disappointed by a Marc-Andre Hamelin purchase. I'm aware that he has his share of critics out there on the internet, but I'm certainly not one of them.


----------

