Piers Lane

Hyperion continues its gargantuan archaeological dig for obscure romantic piano concertos with Volume 75 dedicated to Beethoven’s pupil and assistant Ferdinand Ries. The ever-reliable Australian pianist Piers Lane is in wonderful form on this delightful disc, admirably supported by The Orchestra NOW, a training band of musicians from around the world under the steady baton of Leon Botstein.

A London music journal in the 1820s praised Ries’s playing as being often surprising and “distinguished from that of all others by romantic wildness”. Beethoven had been taught violin by Ries’s father Franz Anton and then took Ferdinand on as his pupil and assistant. He helped Beethoven stage his gigantic 1808 benefit concert which included the premieres of the...