In Vladimir Feltsman’s burly hands, Schubert’s Impromptus leap out of the drawing room into the opera house. The characteristically swimmy resonance of Nimbus’s Wyastone Leys recording venue more than accommodates Feltsman’s outsize dynamics and epic rhetorical style. You notice this flat out in the D899 C minor Impromptu’s lavish ritards and booming bass lines, along with inner voices that are thoroughly milked for profundity. Feltsman plays the E flat Impromptu at a moderate and conservative pace: the pianist’s right-hand scales bind together like mosaic strands rather than the suavely cascading pearls of a Murray Perahia or Maria João Pires, while his broadening of the sforzando chords leading into the minore section (bars 81‑82 and 249‑50) labour the point. But the fluid continuity of Feltsman’s patiently unfolding legato lines in the G flat justifies his expansive conception, although the fourth piece is surprisingly buoyant and graceful compared to what we’ve heard thus far.

D935’s opening F minor Impromptu can withstand Feltsman’s serious demeanour, even if his over-emphatic accents border on the heavy-handed. By contrast, the A flat is more intimately scaled and flexibly phrased. Feltsman plays the B flat Impromptu’s theme simply and directly, while appropriately lightening his tone for the fleet Variations 1 and 2. Nos 3 and 4 tend to wander on account of Feltsman’s focus on local details. While he reclaims a supple stance for the final variation, the rippling passages don’t quite take wing as they do in Vladimir Horowitz’s 1985 DG studio recording. Is his careful and slightly square-cut Fourth Impromptu in F minor a true Allegro scherzando? Certainly it can’t hold a candle to the hurling abandon and emotional intensity of Rudolf Serkin’s amazing live 1957 Lugano reference performance.

Since Feltsman recorded Schubert’s Six Moments musicaux in 1978 (released by CBS Masterworks in 1987), I was curious to compare it with his remake. No 1 remains leisurely and introspective but the distinctions between slurs and staccato now are shapely rather than micromanaged. In 1978, No 2 was a hypnotic slow-motion Adagio timing out to eight and a half minutes. Feltsman now shaves two minutes off of that timing, gracefully and eloquently honouring Schubert’s Andantino directive. No 3 may not disarm to the bracing specifications of Alfred Brendel’s 1971 Philips recording, yet it’s a vast improvement over 1978’s doggedly slow practice-room presentation. Although Feltsman’s right-hand semiquavers are less legato now than before, the new interpretation gains in energy and character. The earlier No 5 was a tad pounded-out, yet I prefer its boisterous appeal to the stouter remake. In No 6 Feltsman appears to have long shaken off his former Richter/Gilels ‘slow‑itis’ in favour of greater mobility and a pliable singing line.

It is in the Adagio and Rondo, the F major and A minor variation sets and the Grazer Fantasie, however, that Feltsman’s inspiration and experience vividly shine. Listen to how gorgeously he floats the dolce cantabile in D156’s first variation, or, in D576, his subtle shifts in articulation on the repeats and his keen ear for harmonic tension. Feltsman provides extensive annotations that are as insightful as his best playing.