not in specific order--

Evgeny Kissin (my absolute favorite)
Martha Argerich (another absolute favorite)
Aimi Kobayashi (a wonderful budding talent)
Daniil Trifonov (an extraordinary artist)
Valentina Lisitsa (a true inspiration)
Wibi Soerjadi (my favorite since age 10 and a severely underrated pianist IMO)
Khatia Buniatshivelli (poetry+fireworks=Magic)
Yuja Wang (great fireworks!)
Vladimir Horowitz (somebody better get working on that time machine lol)
Sara Chang (I couldn't think of anymore pianists)

Sokolov
Sokolov
Sokolov
Sokolov
Sokolov
Sokolov
Jeremy Denk
Sokolov
Sokolov
Sokolov

Sokolov, or possibly Yuja Wang.

Perahia
Schiff
Zimerman
Sokolov

Hamelin, Libetta, Kun-Woo Paik, Zimerman, Sokolov, Anton Nel

Oh yeah, i forgot! I'd like to see Hamelin too!

If you can get that time machine to work, may I borrow it for:

Ferruccio Busoni
Sergei Rachmaninov
Anton Rubinstein
Eugen d'Albert
Bela Bartok
Teresa Carreño
Josef Hofmann
Karl Tausig

some of these pianists I do not know but will definitely investigate.
Well, there's no Lang Lang so far, which is interesting -

My list:
Yeol Eum Son
D.Trifonov
Kissin
Argerich
Ashkenazy
Hamelin
Lisitsa
Kapustin (play his own works)
Kobayashi
#10 open

A time machine and you don't have Liszt in your list? Unbelievable!

My List:

Marc Hamelin
Cyprien Katsaris
Yuja Wang
Arcadi Volodos
Valentina Igoshina
Polina Leschenko
Mikhail Pletnev
Gerhard Oppitz
Zoltan Kocsis
Leif Ove Andsnes

My time machine list:

Liszt
Friedman
Rubinstein (Artur)
Brahms
Beethoven
Chopin
Mendelssohn
Backhaus
Kapell
Ogdon

20th Century Time-Machine Liszt:

- Evgeny Kissin
- Leif Ove Andsnes
- Martha Argerich
- Sviatoslav Richter
- Vladimir Horowitz
- William Kapell
- Sergei Rachmaninov
- Emil Gilels
- Glenn Gould
- Georges Cziffra

This is a fun question. My list, without regard to whether they're still with us:

Artur Rubinstein
Grigory Sokolov
Sergei Rachmaninoff
Sviatoslav Richter
Vladimir Horowitz
Emil Gilels
Nelson Freire
Martha Argerich
Horacio Gutierrez
Van Cliburn (in his salad days)

Well I figured that was a 'given'. A little too obvious to mention, eh?

I was lucky to see Argerich several times in the UK, but I unfortunately missed Ogdon. Reading the bio by Brenda Lucas, I was surprised at the amount of standard rep that Ogdon so often played. (Ogdon in the Grieg or Schumann would be like using a Porsche to drive to the local taco stand.) But Ogdon -with a musical appetite only matched by his gastric appetite- was truly adventurous in 20th century music, and what I would have given to hear him playing works which few but he could ever do justice to.

And here's a postscript, with my "Tier 2" list:

Franz Liszt
William Kapell
Jorge Bolet
John Browning
Leif Ove Andsnes
Sergio Fiorentino
Earl Wild
Krystian Zimerman
Marc-Andre Hamelin
Ivan Moravec
Chico Marx

Time machine list:
Bach. Mozart. Beethoven. Chopin. Liszt. Neuhaus. Horowitz. Gilels. Richter. Gould.
More realistic list:
Sokolov. Lisitsa. Andsnes. Yuja Yang. Kemal Gekic. And my favorite pianist on Pianoworld.
Have not decided on the rest yet.

I saw Hamelin last year It was incredible.

I'm seeing Kissin in September so that should be good...

The guy I'd love to hear the most would be Zimerman, and Barenboim. (Well, Liszt actually, but yeah :p)

"I am Emanuel Ravelli!"

-- Say, I used to know a guy named Emanuel Ravelli who looked just like you!

"I am Emanuel Ravelli!"

-- No wonder you look like him. But I still insist there is a resemblance.

"Heh heh, he thinks I look alike."

Cliburn (even if he hasn't been practicing)
Lupu (WHERE is he on anyone else's list???)
Argerich
Richard Goode (surprised he hasn't been mentioned either, and he doesn't get discussed enough here)
Sokolov
Kissin
Ashkenazy
Kocsis
Lisitsa (partly for the 'visual aspect' -- sorry)
Andre-Michel Schub

OH MY GOSH... LUPU, yes!!!!!!!!

Also, Cliburn, YES!!!

And I've seen Andre-Michel Schub! It wasn't a full length recital, but it was a lecture on Schubert where he played the Wanderer Fantasy (not a fan of that piece but it was a fantastic performance), and the Schubert Op. 90 No. 3 (huge fan of that piece, but it was a very fast performance...), and he also taught a master class the next day.

Richard Goode is very excellent with Mozart, right?

Haven't heard in person, but need to:
Argerich
Sokolov
Lugansky
Bronfman
Hamelin
Orange Soda King
Angelina Pogorelich

Heard in person, but need to again:
Jeremy Denk
Joyce Yang
Yeol Eum Son
Lydia Artymiw - didn't hear her nearly enough while I was at Minnesota. Fascinating and commanding performer.

Need a time machine for:
Hofmann
Sofronitsky
Young Horowitz
Young Gilels
Young Ashkenazy
Premiere of Beethoven's 9th (Beethoven was a pianist afterall)

-Daniel

....and especially with Beethoven.

I'll just name a couple that haven't been mentioned yet.

Living: Berezovsky

Passed: Sofronitsky

edit: Oops, someone did mention Sofronitsky. My bad.

I of course own Goode's Beethoven sonata cycle, and while excellent, I do find it ever-so-slightly "dry." I haven't heard him live, but like Brendel whom I admire (who I also haven't heard in person, unfortunately,) I find there's a slight midi/robotic-like quality in their recordings at times. I'll be the first to blame the engineers and not the pianist. I'm convinced they are currently among the greatest Classical era interpreters.

-Daneil

Dead pianists:
-Godowsky
-Busoni
-De Larrocha
-Alkan
-Liszt
-Beethoven
-Gilels
-Ogdon
-Petri
-Ronald Smith

^^^ Wow, I didn't know that everyone else wanted a time machine so badly, too! Let's get cracking PW and build it!

Oh, and Bach and Mozart.

Mark C --

Good call on Lupu (gorgeous Schubert and Brahms) and Schub (who looks like he wandered in off the set for "Revenge of the Nerds" but played the finest rendition of Chopin's E major Scherzo I've ever heard). And as for Chico, all I can say is:

Groucho (in "Coconuts"): . . . and over here we're going to build a viaduct.

Chico: Vy a duck? Vy a no chicken?

AND he could play the piano like -- well, like no one else.

Lisitsa (purely for the musical aspect :D)
Pollini
Argerich
Zimerman
Bozhanov
Schiff
Barenboim
Volodos
Sokolov (only because people seem to think extremely highly of him, I haven't listened to many recordings by him)
Leslie Howard (I'd like to see him perform the late Liszt works and maybe his own set of 25 etudes)

If you allow me a bonus, I'd love to see Aimi Kobayashi live too.. her Op 10 No 4 blew me away!

Sokolov, yes that's most definitely another one!!

Aside from Chopin and Liszt:

Scarlatti
Gottschalk
Bizet
von Bulow
Albeniz
Siloti
Joplin

Is that 10?

Hoffmann
Liszt
Cziffra
Richter
Sokolov
Alkan

Beethoven
Beethoven
Beethoven
Beethoven
Beethoven
Beethoven
Beethoven
Beethoven
Beethoven
Glenn Gould

To support your thought - although I had some recordings (and thought they were respectable but rather dull), I had really had no idea of what Brendel was doing with Beethoven until I heard him live, and then I finally understood what the fuss was about. It was some of the most amazing music-making I ever expect to hear. But hearing him live was not guaranteed bliss for everyone - I know of other people who heard him live and just couldn't sync up with what he was doing.

I've heard Goode live too, and the playing was, for the most part, several notches more involving than his recordings. But I will say, it did seem to get a bit facile here and there. Still, definitely worth the price of admission.

Of the living pianists I have not yet heard live, here is a random list of ten I would bother to cross the street to go hear:

Eliso Virsaladze
Anne Queffelec
Nelson Freire
Anton Nel
Jeremy Denk
Dezső Ránki
Enrico Pace
Matti Raekallio
Michele Campanella
Mirian Conti

I'm in the fortunate position of having seen & heard live almost all the pianists whose playing I admire (including a few no longer with us, like Michelangeli). But to list those still living whom I'll always have time for, in no particular order:

Mikhail Pletnev
Yuja Wang (next year!)
Andrei Gavrilov
Ivo Pogorelich
Maurizio Pollini
Arcadi Volodos
Denis Matsuev
Lang Lang
Krystian Zimerman
Marc-André Hamelin
Grigory Sokolov

Oops! Is that 11?

Of the pianists who lived during my lifetime but who I never got to hear live, only Sviatoslav Richter, John Ogdon, Vladimir Horowitz and Earl Wild would have been on my list.

Since I hadn't paid attention to Sokolov's recording, I went and looked. I AM BLOWN AWAY: http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=5UJsAN5FNBM&feature=related Probably the best performance of this work that I've heard on youtube. Amazing stuff! I can now see why people want to see Sokolov live.

ASAP:

Argerich
Lisitsa
Kocsis
Kissin
Hamelin

Time machine:
Liszt
Liszt
Liszt
Liszt
Liszt
Beethoven
Saint-Saëns
C. Schumann
Bach
Chopin

open bar

I think the post might benefit from elucidation.

If i had a time machine i'd most defintely traverse time to see the Liszt v Thalberg contest.

I didn't realise there were so many different Liszts!

with timemachine

Mozart
Beethoven
Chopin
Liszt
Scriabin
Rachmaninoff
Horowitz
Sofronitsky
Richter
Gould

I thought of putting Pletnev on my list, but then I remembered that he said some time back that he wasn't going to play piano in public ever again. AFAIK, he hasn't.

Argerich
Sokolov
Zimmerman
Perahia
Lupu
Goode
Denk

wish list from past
Liszt
Beethoven
Chopin
Hofmann
Horowitz
Gilels

Sokolov and Zimerman. There was a time when Argerich was on that list, but she'd probably cancel anyway, so why bother with her...

Bartok, Jason? Interesting!

I'd LOVE to see Rachmaninoff and Horowitz.

Welcome back.
And good "1st" post (or maybe it isn't 1st, I gotta look around some more.)

Time machine:

Liszt
Chopin
Busoni
Horowitz
Rachmaninoff
D'albert
Tausig
Rosenthal
Kapell
Lipatti

....and welcome back to you!! Been awhile, ain't it.....

I thought we were talking about active, living pianists, but those two ABSOLUTELY (believe it or not, Horowitz, more than Rach).

Yeah but I like to be creative =P

Not gonna touch that =p

Thanks--it's been a pretty busy spring/summer

I'd like to see you live, too!

Did he say why?
I remember that he changed his program some while back (could have been the last time I saw him play, a few years ago), substituting Tchaikovsky's G major Sonata for Prokofiev's 7th, because he was recovering from a finger injury. Maybe that's still causing him problems(?).

He's actually the one pianist I'd always pay to hear in recital, because he always think every note afresh (and sometimes provocatively), and never takes anything for granted - the most memorable recital I'd ever been to was by him, when he played Mussorgsky's Pictures (in his own version), and gave three encores, including Liszt's Mephisto Waltz No.1. I don't know of any other living pianist who would play that as one of his encores (on another occasion, Islamey was the 4th encore, after an already long program....he repeated that in Carnegie Hall too).

For me the top ones would definetely be the composer-pianists playing their own works: Chopin, Liszt, Rachmaninoff, Scriabin etc. I'd lose a testicle to witness that.

C'mon.

I think I'd draw the line at lopping off body parts. No one is worth that!

Well, I'm not certain about gas mileage on time machines. At least 5 Liszt recitals at various points in his lifetime would be necessary before climbing back in for the others.

1. Beethoven
2. Mozart
3. Liszt
4. Chopin
5. Schumann
6. Rachmaninoff
7. Haydn
8. Prokofiev
9. Ravel
10. Czerny

No problem -- just get tix to Pollini.

What if you found out at the first concert that he was all hype?

It makes me feel old to see Horowitz on peoples time machine lists, but I'll bet Pianoloverus has seen half the artists mentioned.

Live?

Stores, Kreisler, Brendan, Pogorelich (Angelina), Marc C, Damon, Hakki, Argerichfan, BruceD - heck, everybody in Pianoworld (at least around the Pianist's Corner)(sorry if I forgot you or how to spell your name!). Seeing great artists live is a wonderful thing, but seeing friends, acquaintances, and people you know is such a rewarding experience as well!

Not to mention there are quite a few world-class pianists amongst us here too...!

Yeah, he is pretty amazing. Even in my years in London I never remotely approached what this man has experienced.

Gotta hand it over...

But OTOH, I suppose the love of my life is Anglican Church music, yet not relevant on this forum. Give Mr. pianoloverus his due, I like him.

My list -time machine included-
Bach
Horowitz (young)
Rachmaninoff
Prokofiev
Curzon
Bolet
Lupu
Ashkenazy (young)
Horacio Gutierrez

+1

And I also like the parts of your post that I didn't quote.

I don't get this joke.

I saw Horowitz two or three times, the first being his Historic 1966(?)Return at Carnegie Hall. I had no ticket but there were other ways to get in. One doesn't have to be particularly old to have seen Horowitz. He died in 1989. Rubinstein died in 1982 and Richter died in 1997. The main reason I've been able to see many of the pianists on people's wish lists is that I've lived in NYC since 1962.

How I wish I had seen Richter. I was certainly old enough when he was still performing,but I was too insulated and focused on school.. (Got more of the latter than I ever needed but I digress..)

But PL, do tell about that Horowitz concert: You got in and then, what??

As Liszt has been my favorite composer since I was 10 years old I'm not too concerned about "hype" entering the picture.

However, I am horrified that I left Wilhelm Kempff off my list.

Not your fault, undoubtedly.

Here's the deal:

It begins with, I can't much imagine that someone would single out Czerny as someone from the past to hear, because.....well, you know the stereotyped criticism of his music (especially the exercises, which is the main thing people know) and so I imagine (not completely without basis, I don't think) that he wasn't the very most interesting of musicians and that he put emphasis on execution, perhaps in a quite mechanical way.

And that's also the stereotype of Pollini, not entirely without basis.

Czerny and Pollini, in the views of the critics of each (and probably many more-neutral people too), have much the same attributes, both positive and negative. One might say (controversially) that Czerny was an earlier version of Pollini, and vice versa.

So there you are.

1. Marc-André Hamelin
2. Arcadi Volodos
3. Jorge Luis Prats
4. Krystian Zimerman
5. Martha Argerich
6. Valentina Lisitsa
7. Maurizio Pollini
8. Cyprien Katsaris
9. Yuja Wang
10. Yundi Li

No Tamas Vasary?

Actually I'm not sure he's still performing....I just asked you on the other thread.

If he is, I'd gladly add him to my list!!

Of course I like him very much, but have seen him several times already That's why I haven't added Zoltán Kocsis, Evgeny Kissin or Boris Berezovsky either. As for your question, I'll answer you on the other thread immediately. :P

But it has just crossed my mind that I forgot to add András Schiff. I'd love to see him performing live, but unfortunately he's persona non grata in Hungary right now because of an article he published somewhere.

Good question. I sort of made up my own rules. (Not in any particular order.)

Leonardo da Vinci
Mozart
Bach
Emanuele Arciuli
Béla Bartók
Alkan
Saint-Saëns
Mendelssohn
Yundi Li
Kreisler

Argerich is off for the same reason stores mentions above.

Present:

Lisitsa (for a second go)
Hamelin
Robert Levin
Barenboim
Alessio Bax
Argerich (assuming she wouldn't cancel)
Zimmerman
Perahia
Rafal Blechacz
Kissin

Time Machine

Gould
Rubinstein
Richter
Annie Fischer
Horowitz
Rachmaninoff
Backhaus
Chopin
Beethoven
Carol Mikuli

And the responses continue! Fun to see new names, check 'em out
on You Tube, etc., re-visit old faves. The Time Machine
emerged and we've all taken some spins in it, hopefully.

Meanwhile, chill w/a new fave pianist and composer. You'll
like this!

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=LZBQ7CldB_A

all place winners of piano competiions U.S. and abroad
past and present
Curzon
Rachmaninoff
Prokofiev
Rubinstein
Horowitz
Gutierrez
Argerich
Bolet
Gutierrez
Kissin

Did he 'win' a competition?

In his bio he writes about one where he finished 2nd and apparently never got over not winning.

It's one of my favorite parts of the book, first of all because of how much detail he tells about the competition, secondly because I think it's kind of charming that someone of his level would continue having feelings about not winning a stupid competition 100 years before.

I know it's possible there was some other competition, that he won.


....and did Horowitz really win a competition??....not to mention Rachmaninoff? I remember reading that Rachmaninoff actually came in 2nd in something at his conservatory, to Lhevinne. The story goes that Scriabin was there too, and was 3rd. That conservatory had a tough peer group.

That's not as mind blowing as it looks. Lhevinne, by all accounts I've read, was supposed to be one helluva giant as a pianist.

BTW, I forgot to add him to my 'time machine' list of pianists I'd like to hear. Lhevinne made his NY debut with the Rubinstein 5th Piano Concerto, and if anyone could breathe life into that dated, but still knuckle-busting warhorse, it would be Lhevinne.

Right -- and we don't have to guess! He left recordings -- mostly piano rolls but also some 'real' stuff. I'm glad to have a couple of LP's.

Franz Liszt
Frederic Chopin
Vladimir Horowitz
Evgeny Kissin
Martha Argerich
Yundi Li
Yuja Wang
Arcadi Volodos

A rough summary of the list of pianists (living) we'd like to see in recital ASAP:

ARGERICH
SOKOLOV
HAMELIN
ZIMMERMAN
KISSIN
LISITSA
VOLODOS
WANG
POLLINI
YUNDI LI

Nobody but me would want to see Annie Fischer? I hope it's only because she's lesser known!

Well no one has forgotten Annie I should hope.

She was good:


She smoked as much as Argerich!

Indeed! I prefer her to Argerich, actually.

living pianist I've NOT seen that would complete me.....

Zimerman
Sokolov
Gavrilov
Fou T'song
Pletnev
Weissenberg
Kocsis
Bernstein
Lupu
Yuja Wang

I've no interest in seeing dead pianists, but here are some that I am looking forward to seeing over the next 6 months or so …

Pollini
Yuga Wang (twice)
Aimard
Osbourne
Volodos
Uchida
Brad Mehldau
John Taylor
Andsnes

plenty more I would like to see as well

The most mentions were for: Argerich, Sokolov,Hamelin, Zimmerman, Kissin, Lisitsa
Next tier: Y.Wang, Volodos, Pollini
3rd tier: Denk, Andsnes, Li, Kocsis, Goode

Surprised how few mentions there have been for: Ashkenzy(retired from stage?) Lang Lang, Matsuev, Uchida,Trifonov, Freire, Pletnev

I considered naming Ashkenazy, but I didn't. I'm not sure why, either.

Probably because he hasn't been "around" very much. We tend to think most of the people who've been right in front of us.

About some of the others:

Kocsis: I'd guess that most people just don't know of him that much. Not sure why not -- maybe because he is (I think) a 'quieter' kind of talent, nothing splashy.

Uchida: I would have mentioned her but just forgot. There's been some controversy about her 'facial expressions' and maybe that's a turn-off to some people.

Lang Lang: We're too sophisticated for him.
But in truth, come to think of it, he'd be in my honest top 10 of people I'd want to go and hear, out of curiosity if nothing else. Although, from what people say, I might very well decide I'd never want to hear him again....

Pletnev: I'd bet he would have been mentioned more if not for the 'incident' last year, even though as far as we really know, nothing might have happened. It's not just that his image suffered; it's also that his career has been a bit de-railed, and we just don't hear about him as much as we used to.

Six years ago I saw Lang Lang play in D.C. and was happy I was able to see
him "early on". Since then I came across a YouTube video of him playing the black key etude with an orange. I was furious...what was that all about...poor judgment to say the least. Then I watched some other of his videos & commented that, in his
heart, he knew that's not how he had been taught, etc. Well, as they say:
he's laughing all the way to the bank.

If someone else were paying (with an expensive dinner and French wine thrown in), I could be persuaded to see LL.

Freire was mentioned a few posts above. Now there's someone I'd like to see. His latest recordings have been of top notch quality, and there's a lotta cool stuff on YT.

BTW, nice job with those summaries!

AFAIK, he hasn't been playing in public for quite a while (since before that incident) and I think he said he was done with it for good.

I would doubt the "for good" part.

I don't mean I'm doubting that he might have said it -- I just don't know. Just whether it'll be the case.

We have it in our blood.

Christopher Shih, after winning the Cliburn amateur competition, apparently said he's not going to play for 3 years, which he later amended to mean as referring just to solo repertoire. That won't be the case either.