Sunday Times

[nb: this review was issued in relation to the original CD release on the pianists’ own label – no longer available]

The playing of the British pianist Diana Boyle is quite a discovery. A pupil of Enrique Barenboim (Daniel’s father) and Artur Balsam, she has scarcely flaunted her talents, but they are very considerable indeed. This Brahms sequence comprises some of the most beguiling of the Opp 76 and 116-119 sets of late piano pieces, compiled with due regard for key change. Not one of her interpretations fails to arouse keen interest. She has evidently thought and about the music intensively but her playing never sounds didactic. On the contrary, it has magical freshness and clarity; a precision that is cool, yet full of feeling, perfectly attuned to the elusiveness of this music. Her phrasing, like her use of dynamics, is endlessly bold and fascinating. Often, and most notably in the andante con moto of Op. 76 No. 6, she allows daringly long pauses between the phrases and sections, thereby deepening the music’s mystery. No player or lover of the piano should overlook this disc.

—Paul Driver