[sounddog]

Who are your favorite living classical pianists? My top-ten list in rough order is:

1.Paul Lewis
2.Mitsuko Uchida
3.Steven Osborne
4.Angela Hewitt
5.Maria-Joao Pires
6.Alice Sara Ott
7.Alexandre Tharaud
8.Martha Argerich
9.Yuja Wang
10.Adam Laloum

[richidoo]

Lise De Salle
Yulianna Avdeeva
Julia Fischer
Ingrid Fliter
Leon Fleischer
Alfred Brendel (retired)
Yevgeny Sudbin

[rotarius]

Hey, Ashkenazy, Ax and Pollini are still alive!  Zimerman and Grimaud have always been enjoyable as well.

[tipatina]

Philippe Entremont

[simoon]

In no particular order.

Martha Argerich
Maurizio Pollini
Evgeny Kissin
Emil Gilels
Mitsuko Uchida
Daniil Trifonov
Yuja Wang

And others...

I do hold a special place for Ursula Oppens. Of course, her playing is great, but I love that she has always been a champion for modern and contemporary classical music; Carter, Charles Wuorinen, Stefan Wolpe, Joseph Schwantner, Joan Tower, etc.

For example, her performance of Carter's Piano Concerto, is world class. And it is not exactly an easy piece to play.

[Freo-1]

I'll add Anna Federova and Khatia Buniatishvila to the list.

[Tyson]

Based on what he did at the Van Cliburn competition, Yunchan Lim is going to be one of these generational talents.  His Rachmaninov in the finale was incredible, but I think his Liszt Transcendent Etudes in the semi-finals was even better.

[S Clark]

Based on what he did at the Van Cliburn competition, Yunchan Lim is going to be one of these generational talents.  His Rachmaninov in the finale was incredible, but I think his Liszt Transcendent Etudes in the semi-finals was even better.

I was in the audience  for the Semi's  on the 5th row  slightly left.... as good a seats as you could ask for.  And the Liszt didn't strike me as all that special... but I'd been listening aaaaallllllll day. Rene'e and I were really tired and thinking about heading out early anyway.   
But man, what I've hear of that Rach 3rd was .... wow.  Amazing.  I don't think I have anything on my shelves that is comparable.   

[Tyson]

Oh man I am so jealous!!!!  Can't believe you got to see that live.   

For the Liszt Transcendental Etudes, listen to some other pianists first and then listen to what Lim did and I promise you your jaw will drop.  Pretty much every other pianist I've heard struggles to keep up with the music, while Lim is so technically facile that he can actually make the music sound playful even in the heaviest passages.  I literally could not believe what I was hearing.  It's that sense of play that really sets him apart, IMO.

Lim plays piano the way Michael Jordan played basketball - such a high level that you can feel the sheer joy that underpins what they do.

[Chris from Lafayette]

Who are your favorite living classical pianists?

Really impossible to say, but I find the following (in no particular order) always interesting:

• Nikolai Lugansky
• Igor Levit
• Khatia Buniatishvili
• Yeol Eum Son (aka "YES')
• Pavel Kolesnikov
• Martha
• Yuja