There’s some extraordinary playing on this beautifully recorded disc. The Armenian-born American pianist exhibits a profound empathy for Rachmaninov’s music, revelling in its richness of sonority, its contrasting moods of elation and melancholy, and its structural fluidity. What really binds this recital into an utterly compelling musical experience is the sheer range and tonal variety of his pianism.

...the whole hour slips by as if in a dream, and I don’t have the superlatives to do justice to his display of deeply considered pianism. Familiar pieces are imbued with such magic that they seem new-minted; everything is nuanced with a velvet touch. The bells of the B minor Prélude Op 32/10 never sounded more sweetly sad; the transcriptions by that other keyboard poet, Arcadi Volodos, are ravishing.

There are certainly no doubts about the fluency of Babayan’s playing, nor about his affinity with Rachmaninov, even if that is rather over-egged in the gushing liner notes. There’s a sense of cool refinement about everything he does, keeping plenty in reserve in even the most technically demanding passages, but the impression his playing leaves is often a rather neutral one.