There has been quite a bit of excitement around the young pianist Yunchan Lim, and this album of Chopin's Études didn't take long to make classical best-seller lists when it appeared in the spring of 2024. Everything one has heard is true. Lim's technical equipment is fearsome. The conversation-type notes here, with Lim's assent, name Ignaz Friedman, Alfred Cortot, Youri Egorov, and Vladimir Horowitz as influences on the pianist, and one is reminded especially of Cortot's marvelous control married to a great sense of freedom. Lim's left-hand work throughout is astonishing, with a tense energy that propels even the quieter pieces forward. Sample the Étude in C minor, Op. 10, No. 12, the "Revolutionary," for a taste of how that left hand can bring a totally revelatory quality to even an extremely familiar piece. On one hand, Lim's choice of these well-worn pieces may seem a safe one, but it is actually quite gutsy; he has to stand out from the crowd, and he does so brilliantly. Beyond all the technical equipment, though, is a youthful attitude that makes these performances special indeed. There are few others who have been able at this age (when the album appeared, Lim was not yet 21) to bring both the precision and the starry-eyed freshness heard here. Lim proposes programs for the whole and fits the pieces together convincingly. "I'm sure tomorrow I'll have other ideas," Lim concedes, but this is just part of what makes this such an extraordinary release. This is Lim's debut album on Decca, and one is excited about the prospect of hearing him in the likes of the Chopin and Liszt sonatas. Since becoming the youngest-ever winner of the Van Cliburn Competition at 18, Lim has done nothing but live up to and exceed already stratospheric expectations. Listen and marvel. ~ James Manheim