Mozart Piano Concerto 21.

cpdunn, as for Serkin, you are probably referring to his recordings after he moved to the US. i.e. the beethovens with bernstein and nyphil, his beethoven sonatas... etc. etc. I find all of them lifeless and sterile.
But... do you know his recordings with Adolph Busch?
The best Serkin recordings that I know of are his Schubert Fantasy with Busch(transcendant and sublime), Brahms vln sonatas with Busch, Brahms A minor piano quartet, Mozart and Haydn trios with Busch... This is the Serkin that I know and love. I have a feeling that he came to the states and was offered a limitless carte blanche recording contract and just churned them out.

You mention Bartok was a supreme pianist/artist, I completely agree. Take a listen as well to Ravel and Sarasarte performing their works on the piano rolls, absolutely stunning!!! Unbelievable! They are poetic with awesome skill. The same can be said about Rachmaninov's playing. I'll have to invest in the Szigeti. On the Pletnev, I'll have to give a second hearing. Your comparison of Hahn to a "lighter tasting peach" well describes vs the perfect tech sound of Oistrakh or the tremendous emotional content of Heiftz's playing. By the way did we ever answer Gdollar's question about the recommendation of the 21st Mozart? If he is reading along he sure is getting his money's worth on this thread! Maybe time to start other questions. BTW there is a classical chat site over at Gramophone. Its OK, hope to get better.

Yes start other threads to have more discussions on other works, it gets boring to talk about imaginary improvements we can barely detect with the latest 1K interconnect, and my CDP is better than your CDP because it costs more and has latest tweak etc.

Buxter tells it like it is, I love it. Very interesting to hear others impressions, however different they may be, heh heh. As far as best Mozart piano 21 I have to restate that I am not really happy with many of the major artists recordings: Perahia, Brendel, Ucida, Schiff and several others just seem a bit too reserved to me and lack the energy/vigor needed to draw out full contrasts in the work. I am sure there are better new versions out there for me, or even the small labels like Jando/Naxos can sometimes be preferable.(even though I only like a few in the Jando series and think the others are just average)

Also we have not fully investiged the thread on Mozart 41,
Buxter and I seem to have very different tastes here.

Mega, you need to look into the incredible recordings by Moravec before they go out of print, released 1996, which will br soon I'm sure. P.C.#24&25 Marriner/St. Martins/Hanssler Classics, conducting/fair,orchestra/OK,Sound quality/fair . P.C.#'s 14,23,25. With the legendary Vlach conducting the legendary Czech,Supraphon released 1996, so it will also very soon be out of print. You will thank me on this one. Morave is the only pianist that takes the opening to the 2nd movement in #24 perfectly, the piano is in perfect tune. About sym #41, I'll start another thread.

I'm in a bit of a rush today, so I'm going to state unsubstantiated opinions for now (yeah, what else is new!?).

Buxter:
I agree with your peach analogy completely vis-a-vis Hahn.

Yes, more of the US Serkin (I agree with the impression of sterility). I have none of the Busch recordings, I'm afraid.

I really like Akiko's Dvorak! I listened to it again last night and loved it. Hmmm... I did not like the Philips engineering, however. One of their worst efforts.

When I said that Joshua Bell was "slipping," I meant exactly what you state. I saw him on A&E (or was it PBS?) sometime this winter and it was embarassing. I had to change the station. Saw Shlomo Mintz in Chicago a year or so ago. He had great "presence."