Debussy

Following two fine recordings of Chopin, the 2015 Chopin Competition winner Seong-Jin Cho ushers in a Debussy centennial (he died in 1918) with this beautifully judged album. The two books of *Images* are done with great style and a ravishing feel for their color and texture—he really brings out the different Impressionist moods of each of the six movements. He plays *Children’s Corner* with wit and a fine feeling for the piece’s visual prompts, while the *Suite bergamasque* is handled with enormous sensitivity (“Clair de lune” is gorgeous). “L’isle joyeuse,” almost a pendant to the *Suite bergamasque*, is an imaginative finale.

Youthful Korean pianist Seong-Jin Cho seized the spotlight with a hard-fought win in the 2015 International Chopin Piano Competition and was promptly signed to Deutsche Grammophon.