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Title: An outstanding disc.
Review: Malikova's right hand floats the melodies over her rock-solid left, generating excitement with no trace of glibness. I also very much like the darkness that she and Sanderling bring to the first movement of the Fourth Concerto, a tough work to hold together, but that here seems to grow with organic inevitability as well as an unusual amount of emotional depth. The second movement has particular cogency, with Malikova clearly making an effort to characterize each episode, building the work to an unusually satisfying conclusion.She also makes a persuasive case for the neglected First Concerto (actually the largest of these three), aided in no small degree by a conductor clearly aware of the music's debt to Beethoven and Mozart. The sonics are warm and well balanced and the piano tone is gleaming.
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