A close…ambience characterises this recording…befitting Brian Hsu’s direct, uncluttered…journey through this monumental piano cycle. In Book 1, a listener could well take dictation from the steady tread of the opening ‘Chapelle de Guillaume Tell’, while the rolling accompaniment and ringing cantabile of ‘Au lac de Wallenstadt’ transpire on the same external level. ‘Au bord d’une source’ is as luminous as the antipodal ‘Pastorale’…Hsu’s Book 2 fares best in the three beautifully paced Petrarch Sonnets…Book 3 inspires some of Hsu’s finest playing. He brings engaging sweep and continuity to the second ‘Aux cyprès de la Villa d’Este’ piece and finds a multitude of nuance and shading within the rippling arpeggios of ‘Les jeux d’eaux à la Villa d’Este’….Hsu really does project the appropriate timbral flavour, while throwing himself into the concluding ‘Sursum corda’ as if it were a matter of life or death.