Pollini the Great

I've got to confess I don't worship Pollini as some others do. But in the last 3 sonatas of Schubert Pollini is indisputably a master musician.

Pollini's one of the few pianists who play out all the notes without jamming them together. The semidemiquavers come as semidemiquavers, each invested with a distinct quality. Try the start of the 1st movement of D958. The stormy passion is all the more striking, because it's executed with such precision and determination. Each melodic line is spun out without haste, yet the spacious, vast soundscape of Schubert never loses for a second its mesmerising quality.

Some might find him slightly more detached than is palatable. But I believe no other living pianist is able to inform his/her playing of these highly romantic works with such dignity. Majestic progressions alternate with wistful childplay.

The only serious competition comes from Murray Perahia's recent Sony set & the great Richter's live recordings on the budget Regis label. But even those two do not quite match Pollini in his transcendental techniques.