Schubert, Chopin, Liszt, Yang - Watercolour

The Guardian 60

Yuanfan Yang (piano)
(Orchid Classics)

This is, in all respects, a young man’s disc. Born in Edinburgh in 1997, Yuanfan Yang is already a promising pianist-composer and winner of many international competitions. He plays Schubert’s B flat Impromptu, Op 142 No 3, Chopin’s F minor Fantasie Op 49 and Liszt’s Vallée d’Obermann with youthful confidence. More interesting are his choices of Philip Cashian’s Landscape and his own Three Aquarelles – watercolours – written when Yang was in his mid-teens. They are vividly programmatic, relating to waves, the sinking sun and a haunted bell, and ranging in mood from splashy virtuosity to a soulful poignancy impressive in one so young. The recital ends with a gently rocking Farewell to Stromness by Peter Maxwell Davies, a short, wistful favourite.