I’m in full agreement with Bill Moore on the qualities of Argerich’s Shostakovich disc, issued last year. Argerich fans will be delighted that the latest volume in her “Martha Argerich and Friends - Live from the Lugano Festival” series has just been issued. As with previous volumes, the repertoire ranges widely and her enviable list of “friends” includes such names as Renaud Capuçon, Lilya Zilberstein and Mischa Maisky. Argerich herself features in many of the works, including a fiery Mozart Andante and Variations with Stephen Kovacevich, a gutsy Schumann violin sonata (no. 2) with Capuçon and a resounding Rachmaninov two-piano Suite No. 1, Op. 5 with Lilya Zilberstein. Mischa Maisky is joined by his daughter Lily and violinist Alissa Margulis in Shostakovich’s first piano trio, and the final disc in the set includes much Piazzolla and Mikhail Pletnev’s Fantasia elvetica (Swiss Fantasy) for two pianos and orchestra, composed in 2006 and conducted by Pletnev himself. As with previous volumes, the set is filled with the spontaneous and impassioned music-making which is Argerich’s trademark.

Reviewed by Anne McAlister