For me -
Liszt Sonata has been a brilliant benchmark, love comparing recordings.
Chopin etudes, for technical skill, it’s my go-to crystalline comparison.
Randomly Schumann’s Carnaval - A brilliant way to hear how each different pianist can shift character.
Scriabin sonata No4 - To me it’s one of the best pieces to hear a pianist in dynamic repeated-chordal passages.
Cliche but Rach 3 - hackneyed but I love hearing a fresh interpretation that reignites my love for it.
Fo golden age mofos:
Pimp campy, rappah 2, chop c# min waltz
Surprising amount of Golden Age mofos recorded the Carnaval actually.
Chop Waltz a great shout, when it’s elegantly done it’s amazing.
HR#2 separates the dull academic pianists from those with verve and flair, love to hear it well done…hate to hear it when it’s boring as fuck.
Pimp Isolde deathfuck, Tot, Norma (don’t think I’ve heard a Norma that’s better than 80% tbh).
The thalburglah Moses arpz orgy, lol.
Bolet, Hamelin & Tozer for me in Norma, which do you think gets the 80%?
The doc that I’ve heard I dislike.
Bolet gets 80%… note hitting accuracy from the arpz onwards 
I’ve not listened to it in ages, but I did rather like the live Thomas Wakefield Norma. Not sure where my cd is now.
Seen it before!
I can’t actually remember Liszt’s markings (which is pretty disgraceful considering I have a lot of the piece memorised!), but he does what a lot of people do in that the section at 7.07 is NOT agitato in the opera. When I took the time to listen to the original material properly, it’s far more melancholy in nature.
That’s Liszt’s fault because he marked it con agitazione (also transposed to b minor, but that’s more tolerable).
This is what it’s supposed to sound like, with a permanent vocal “tear”.
Norma is a tricky one. If Bolet had taken it up 15 years earlier I think I would have had my man, but… alas…
Kocsis does perhaps the most “entertaining” and pianistically impressive version I’ve heard, and I appreciate it because of that, but musically it’s not at all the way I want it. Shion Ota felt a bit like that in Hamamatsu as well, and Ran Dank earlier. Lots of other good pianists have played it as well - Lewenthal, Hamelin, Ginzburg, Dichter - but I’m not happy with any of them. The harsh reality is that despite that I love it to the point where I’ve learnt the whole thing myself, I don’t listen to it since I’m not aware of a satisfying recording.
I don’t know, but I think Liszt meant something like that. Just a slight agitation in “voice” and mood so you have a tension to release in the following section, not turning it to a full call for arms as pianists tend to do because of that agitazione marking.
There’s no entirely satisfactory version for me either. My musical preferences in this piece are dictated by the opera which is a top 3 favourite of mine (especially this Covent Garden debut version by Callas which I linked above). As such, I actually think Howard is the best I’ve heard, although I like Kocsis in the arpeggios.
Could be. If I had played this one I would’ve followed Bellini. I doubt most pianists have even heard the opera tbh.
Another Norma (you may have heard this in the member recs!!)… but 8.07 is the relevant segment and I would like to think this is more in the spirit… if in Bb min this time haha.
I would really like to get the Liszt one properly up and going but my solo lh octs aren’t that good in that particular kind of wrist motion. It’s, like da X says above, a piece I care about sufficiently that I want to produce my own version because others range from being tolerable to annoying me!
Yeah, that’s definitely more like it!
iizc tha LEZBO of all mofoz haz a gud NORMA rec 
or pozz it wuz hiz DJ but i remembah thinkin ‘daim’
i liztend to many different prok 8 recordingz ovah tha yrz wit rectum cigar n railkillah being my favz
pozz tha BRONFMOFO alzo
Hahah da Prick8 a predickable Robbah pick 
Da Lezbo can zumtymz zurprize but tiz a caze of context
Tiz lyk comin from a zmall hometown n da HOT CHICK in zchool iz now juz a 6/10 when u expozed to college chix
Tru, surprised da Robbah didn’t pick da GAV. Actually that’s a piece that I find it hard to get into, except for the last movement.