I'd take Valentina over Lang Lang any day.
And she is very clever to be exploiting modern technologies. I predicted many years ago that it would turn out well for her and I was right. Its a shame very few other pianists have caught on.

IMO Valentina is the best pianist out there. I am no expert when it comes to the piano as I am just starting to learn to play but I think I have a good ear and I can say that her playing is superior to a lot of other pianists. Then again it most probably is a question of personal taste.

I'd take Valentina over Lang Lang any day.

And she is very clever to be exploiting modern technologies. I predicted many years ago that it would turn out well for her and I was right. Its a shame very few other pianists have caught on.

If you do not know someone personally how do you know what music is to them and how can you judge her? Even if you read a thousand interviews or watch all her videos or see her live, you will not know or understand even a fraction of her personality and why she does what she does. It's good that your thoughts and opinions have absolutely no effect on her situation and can't really hurt what she'd doing because it would be sad otherwise. I sure hope she never gets discouraged by such pointless rantings.
Music just is, stop trying to explain it. It's for everyone.

I've heard that Rachmaninoff helped at least one small-handed person rewrite those opening chords in the 2nd to make them playable (instead of, as was suggested in another post, telling the person to play a different concerto). Too bad he didn't provide an ossia in the score. Maybe we should just be grateful that he didn't write a lot more stuff unreachable-by-regular-hands than he did.

And, yes, judging from the various YouTube clips, Lisitsa is not a very interesting musician, although she can play way fast. Too robotic and too reliant on technique effects for my taste. But I'll admit that when I was much younger, I might have felt differently. Funny how time changes one's perspective...

But why are there so many these proponents of insubstantial virtuosity all over the place right now? It's practically like the middle of the 19th century is being replayed all over again. These virtuosi are just crawling out of the woodwork, and seem to have found an audience of extremely avid fans. It's really very strange.

Although I understand the "wow" factor (and enjoy it a lot myself), I also think that there are other factors in music that are at least as important. Make that "more important". It really is disturbing to me that a lot of people seem not to have any idea at all of why high-level technical prowess together with just a rudimentary, barely cultivated musicality just doesn't add up to "great".

In my experience the more successful a person is the less likely they are to criticize others, unless there is some tangible advantage to be gained by doing so.

Not always true.. having an opinion can be a good thing I've seen (as we all have) successful, famous people criticizing someone else. But so what? Not everybody is going to like what you do. And THAT is a fact of life. We just have to accept it and move on. There's no point in trying to please everybody, it is impossible. There are people that surely think Richter was a "bad pianist". You just have to forget about it. But I really don't think criticism is always such a bad thing, especially when justified or constructive.

Well stated, PianoJerome! She not only plays, but mastered all 24 Chopin Etudes-very few pianists can claim to have that accomplishment.

Why not simply start a new thread/topic and converse with members who are currently active??