Bruce Liu: Chopin Piano Competition 2021 — pearly clarity

An online presence has brought a new worldwide audience to the most prestigious music competitions. This year’s International Chopin Competition in Warsaw cited viewing figures in the millions, so more people will have watched the Canadian pianist Bruce Liu take first place than for any winner before.

This disc offers a selection of his live performances from the competition, including mazurkas, studies and other solo pieces from across Chopin’s oeuvre, and marks a renewed collaboration between DG and the Fryderyk Chopin Institute.

Looking back at his path to victory, Liu said, “I was really trying to find new things until the last minute that I was backstage”, and that spontaneity is a feature that makes his performances feel constantly alive. Nothing ever settles into routine.

A pearly clarity to his sound graces his Chopin with old-world charm. There is an insouciant finesse to the way he flaunts his virtuosity in the Variations on “Là ci darem la mano” from Mozart’s Don Giovanni. The Andante spianato and Grande Polonaise Brillante are fluid, expressive, sparkling. In the wistful B Minor Mazurka, Op. 33 No. 4, he is at once pensive and playful, and his Étude in A Minor, Op. 25 No. 4, scampers past with a spring in its step.

Thanks to live recordings made at the time we can listen back over the history of past winners in their competition performances. Liu has little to fear from the comparisons. This is a pianist with a captivating musical personality.

★★★★☆

‘Chopin Piano Competition 2021’ is released by DG