Yes, I think those three are given. It’s thereafter it starts getting interesting. I’m hugely fond of Prats and Tiempo myself. But, where does that leave Freire? Renard? Novaes? Gelber?
Not as far as I can tell, I was just making the same point as publius85. I know how enraged my Mexican girls get when people think they are from South America. Anyway, for me the greatest is probably Arrau, then Freire. I suppose if I’m being objective Argerich has to be up there, even though her playing’s never done much for me. I like Prats too, btw. Although I haven’t heard much solo recordings from him.
Same here, but Argerich’s got to be there if I am to stand behind my vote. She is amazing, and you can’t ignore someone like that.
But that’s me - subjective votes are perfectly ok. In fact, I encourage them. The fun with this for me is to hear what you think, not what you think you should think.
I’ll vote tonight, but I think I’m going to drop Freire incidentally. He’s great & like him, but I also find him rather forgettable. I have actually never returned to any of his recordings after the 1st hearing until your 2017 Paris recital.
He’s wonderful in almost anything. I had a ticket for a recital with him in ~2014, but he had to cancel due to problems with his green card. The organizers promised they’d invite him again later, but… not yet.
You should listen to the 2014 one from Pleyel too if you haven’t, even though the sound wasn’t great. He played the best nocturne I’d ever heard (tied with Horowitz’s live op 72 in that recital with D960 before his retirement). He has the best crescendo of any pianist that I can think of (perfectly graded). In fact, he’s one of the few pianists I’ll hear in just about anything.