Etudes Op 10 & Op 25

It was in 1959 and 1960 that **Vladimir Ashkenazy** completed his first recording of the Etudes. It is difficult to resist drawing parallels with the young *Evgeni Kissin* 30 years later: once in- a-generation virtuosos, both of them, with a musical maturity that always makes their fingers say something. An essential aspect of *Chopin's* poetics of the piano lies in his exploration of the resources of the instrument and the potentialities of timbre to be exploited by a new keyboard technique.