This new, outstanding live release featuring esteemed pianist Martha Argerich was recorded in Warsaw in 2006 at the Chopin and His Europe International Music Festival. For this programme, she performs one of her favorite Concertos: Shostakovich’s First. She is joined from the podium by her long-time musical partner Alexander Rabinovich. Also featured on this recording is the light-spirited Symphony No. 9, also by Shostakovich. The International Music Festival ‘Chopin and his Europe’ – an international music festival organized in Warsaw since 2005 by the Fryderyk Chopin Institute, presenting European music within the context of its links with the life and work of the Polish pianist, composer and teacher Fryderyk Chopin (1810–1849). The project is realized as part of the government programme ‘Fryderyk Chopin Heritage 2010’. One important strand to the festival programme is historical performance – presenting works as they were originally heard, on period pianos in the possession of the Fryderyk Chopin Institute: an Erard from 1849, a Pleyel from 1846 and a Graf (a copy of an instrument from c. 1819). The festival is organized in collaboration with the Warsaw Philharmonic, Teatr Wielki – Polish National Opera and Polish Radio II.