“The Pastoral thrives on Biret’s strength as a colourist. This performance is also quite a tribute to the piano as an instrument. The first movement is bathed in a golden sound, with an ethereal cantilena pervading the entire Andante that follows. This movement is nearly eighteen minutes long, and yet Biret’s serenity carries one along. Of all the music on records it is the storm that is the most Lisztian, the massive effects creating a spine-chilling climax…The piano tone throughout is sumptuous.” Gramophone
“The unfolding of the finale theme in the 9th Symphony before the baritone entry is daringly slow and Fürtwanglerian. Indeed her speeds are often measured. Yet it works. Biret clearly loves the sustaining powers of the instrument…She never resorts to routine and it seems to me very much playing in the Kempff-Beethoven mould. I was captivated by these realizations.”Hi-Fi News