Ranked among the most insightful of pianists for his exploration of the spiritual depths of the music he interpreted, Alfred Cortot was a multi-faceted musician with a wide-ranging repertoire. This album couples small treasures such as the four miniatures by Purcell and Bach’s transcription of a Vivaldi Concerto, with masterpieces by Mendelssohn and Franck, of whose music Cortot was one of the greatest exponents. In Cortot’s hands, even Saint-Saëns’s technically demanding Étude en forme de Valse poses no obstacles to his enviable lightness of touch.