His media life began with a bang. In 2003, he put down and challenged the 3e prize in the Queen Elizabeth Competition because he thought he deserved better. Since then, he has been considered pretentious and impulsive. And if, 20 years later, we wondered, for once, if he is not simply lucid and thoughtful. Dong Hyek Lim is a wonderful pianist who should have a more dazzling career. Martha Argerich is right to have sponsored him throughout these years and to have recorded with him miraculous Symphonic dances by Rachmaninoff. Warner is also right to continue recording it in seminal works (Goldberg Variations of Bach, Preludes of Chopin…). There is nothing fortuitous or futile in this ideal pairing (79 minutes): we hear the determined concentration of a pianist who works in a “subtle essential”. More desperate, Uchida whispers more, on a piano with a less open sound. The very brilliant setting of the treble is probably the major enigma of this high quality CD.
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