here's an intelligent, polished and technically brilliant player who gets under the skin of the music. He demonstrates both thunderous strength and delicacy in the Polonaise-Fantasie.

One of the most striking features of Wunder's playing is his sound. His touch is always healthy, never harsh or aggressive; attacks and releases are remarkably even...[The performances] are sophisticated, suave, unerringly beautiful, models of musical clarity and textual fidelity. What I miss is claustrophic desperation...Do Ingolf Wunder's performances...presage a new view of this beloved Romantic, tailored for less encumbered, cooler sensibilities?

He begins this Chopin recital with a deeply considered account of the B minor Sonata, the tempos of the opening and closing movements controversially cautious, but enabling him to voice even the most challenging passages with a lovely warmth and clarity...The rest is equally impressive. Although Wunder’s speeds are more conventional, every piece is again thoughtfully shaped, and his passage work in the andante spianato is dazzling.

This debut for Deutsche Grammophon allows us all to judge his competition pieces...the Scherzo [of the Piano Sonata No. 3] alone moves from rippling, ebullient industry to soul-searching intimacy, and back again, within three minutes, Wunder displaying a poise and tonal command way beyond his tender years.