But the music is our primary concern here, and each disc fully testifies to the Russian pianist's eclectic repertoire, prodigious technical and recreative gifts, sheer physical power, inquisitive mind, uncommon sensitivity, and, above all, individuality. The recordings display a multitude of Richters at work. He can be delicate or brusque, withdrawn or optimistic, scrupulous or cavalier, an architect or a miniaturist, a poet or a pedant. One consistent attribute is the pianist's distinctive tone. The beauty and clarity of his sound shimmers with prismatic transparency at all dynamic levels.
Chords are always translucent and well balanced.
Few pianists can summon the concentration and control that enable Richter, with his hypnotic legato, not only to sustain the unusually slow pace of the Sarabande of Bach's Third English Suite, or the First Movement of the Schubert G Major Sonata, D.894, but also to draw the listener into his sound world. Richter's Bach has become more humane and involved over the years. One does not go to this pianist expecting the last word in Baroque style and ornamentation, yet the sarabandes of the English and French suites are mesmerizing in their breathless calm, and so is the fugue of the early D minor Toccata. Equally impressive is the grand design and emotional breadth brought to the Overture in the French Style . Listeners have the opportunity to compare Richter's unbridled, pianistically oriented 1959-60 Beethoven performances of the Op.