Solitary refinement

When Zuo Zhang had the opportunity to release her debut album, she chose musical works by two great composers, Franz Liszt and Maurice Ravel.

"I played lots of music pieces by Liszt and Chopin when I was a child so Liszt is like a friend to me," says the pianist. "As for Ravel, he is my favorite composer so his works were important to me when I started to prepare the repertoire for my first album."

The album, released by Germany's record label Deutsche Grammophon on Oct 14, is titled Ravel-Liszt. It took Zuo about two days to finish recording at Air Studios in London on Aug 16 and 17, 2018, performing under the baton of Estonian conductor Paavo Jarvi and the Philharmonia Orchestra. The repertoire includes Ravel's Piano Concerto in G major, Gaspard de la Nuit and Liszt's Piano Concerto No. 2 in A major.