Mozart & Contemporaries is Víkingur Ólafsson’s shimmering follow-up to last year’s award-winning coupling of Debussy and Rameau. Limelight critic Rebecca Franks awarded it five stars, declaring that “it bears all the now-familiar Ólafsson hallmarks: that distinctive sound; those imaginative programming touches; the sense that the music is both timeless and freshly minted.”

Instrumental Recording of the Year

She was equally enthusiastic about Deutsche Grammophon’s engineering. “Ólafsson sounds utterly at home and natural in the studio. There’s warmth and clarity that allows his playing to flourish; the tone is almost plain, yet deceptively so, as the result is beautiful and intimate.”

Earlier this month, Clive Paget caught up with the Icelandic pianist to find out all about his childhood tug-of-war with Mozart, how he makes a program, and why he considers the Salzburg wunderkind to have been a late bloomer.

There’s an element of Groundhog Day here! It was this time last year I was talking to you about your winning disc of Ravel and Debussy – in fact you were teasing me about the content of this album. So, what made you choose Mozart as its subject?

I think it...