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Claudio Colombo Plays the Complete Piano Repertoire - Really? · The Piano Maven with Jed Distler

• 0:12
  This is Jed Dissler, and welcome to the Piano
• 0:17
  Maven, your friendly podcast guide to piano recordings.
• 0:21
  I hope you will consider taking out a paid subscription
• 0:26
  to the Piano Maven podcast through my sub stack
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  page, and I've provided a link to do so in my
• 0:34
  episode description. And paid subscribers get
• 0:38
  a free download at the beginning of each month,
• 0:42
  which is usually a rare piano recording from
• 0:46
  my collection. Anyway, I hope you will consider
• 0:49
  subscribing because a subscription that you pay
• 0:53
  for helps keep this podcast going So the $64
• 0:58
  ,000 question this week is who is Claudio Colombo?
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  If you are a piano maven who likes to browse
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  on streaming services, as I do, it is possible
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  that you may have encountered the name Claudio
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  Colombo. person appears to have recorded not
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  only the entire standard piano repertoire and
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  a lot of harpsichord repertoire, but also a lot
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  of off -the -beaten track repertoire. And if
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  you look online, this person or this persona
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  is apparently based in Milan, Italy. And Milan
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  is... kind of my second home. So maybe I'm going
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  to encounter Claudio Colombo at my local pizzeria
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  or shopping in the supermarket. Anyway, I'm browsing
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  now on my Spotify account, and I'm going to type
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  in the name Claudio Colombo and popular releases
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  by Claudio Colombo. And I am seeing tons of releases.
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  I'm seeing albums of music by Louis Couperin,
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  by Gottschalk. by Bartok and Mozart and Parabell,
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  Charony, etudes by Stephen Heller, music of Ernesto
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  Nazareth. I see an album that has 25 etude characteristic
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  by a composer named Jean -Baptiste Duvernoy.
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  I never heard of that composer before. I see
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  the complete keyboard works of William Byrd.
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  There are many, many volumes of Johann Strauss
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  waltzes for piano. The 50 Etudes by Henri Bertini.
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  And oh my goodness, there are all four Brahms
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  symphonies arranged for piano solo. And there
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  are lots of chamber works in piano four -hand
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  arrangements, which I guess Claudio Colombo is
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  multi -tracking himself. The list goes on and
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  on and on and on. I mean, this discography makes
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  Joyce Hatto look like nothing by comparison.
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  I suspect what this is though is that this Claudio
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  Colombo character is processing MIDI files which
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  are played back through an electronic keyboard
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  or something equivalent to that and the big giveaway
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  and you know what makes me really suspect this
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  is that you also see albums that contain art
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  songs arranged for either clarinet or piano or
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  flute and piano. Okay? And then, when you actually
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  listen to these examples, the clarinet sounds
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  like a really bad MIDI version of a clarinet,
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  and the flute sounds anything but like a real
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  flute. Furthermore, you get almost no rubato.
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  You get a limited range of dynamics. And I have
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  to say, it... wasn't really unpleasant listening
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  to parts of the four Brahms symphonies played
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  by or, let's say, uploaded by Claudio Colombo,
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  but there are some real duds among these releases.
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  I mean, he could have picked better tempos for
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  the piano four hands version of Beethoven's string
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  quartet number one, opus 18 number one, and I
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  found 14 volumes of American piano rags played
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  by or I should say allegedly played by Claudio
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  Colombo and you've never heard such rhythmically
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  stiff reproductions all on the same dynamic level.
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  Ouch! And the MIDI harpsichord version of the
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  Bach -Golberg variations sounds a little bit
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  like there might be a human being involved, because
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  the tempos change from variation to variation,
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  and I would imagine that one has to be a human
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  being to figure out the tempo changes between
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  variations. But the rather metronomic -sounding
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  Fresca Baldy pieces played back on a piano patch
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  are kind of a giveaway. It's... quite an achievement
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  that this Claudio Colombo character has had the
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  time and the energy to create hundreds of releases
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  like this. I'm looking now at the complete Scarlatti
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  sonatas. There's one version on piano and then
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  there's one version on harpsichord for the love
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  of Pete. And I'm still browsing as I'm speaking
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  and Oh my goodness, now I'm seeing English folk
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  songs for piano and Danish folk songs for piano.
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  And again, these are heavy and metronomic and
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  robotic performances. Do you really need to hear
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  this? I think the idea... of Claudio Colombo
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  and the complete published keyboard repertoire
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  in MIDI files is rather amazing, I have to admit.
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  And as I keep browsing down the list of available
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  titles, some of which I've dipped into, I keep
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  wondering what repertoire is going to pop up
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  next. I wonder... if there's going to be, or
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  maybe there already exists, a Claudio Colombo
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  edition of Wagner's complete Ring Cycle arranged
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  for one piano, four hands. I actually have the
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  Ring Cycle arranged for four hands. I got that
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  from IMSLP, and I even printed it out. And I've
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  had this obsession about maybe one day performing
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  the entire opera Götterdammerung in the four
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  -hand transcription. without singers, of course,
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  but I have to find another pianist crazy enough
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  to collaborate with me. But maybe it's better
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  to wait for the Claudio Colombo interpretation
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  first. You know, I'm thinking, you know what
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  would really be cool? A MIDI version of the complete
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  piano score of that opera by Gabriel von Weidich
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  called The Heretics. This was the last of this
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  composer's many, many operas, most of which never
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  saw the light of day. This opera supposedly lasts
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  eight hours, and Gabriel van Vedich finished
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  the opera's 1 ,531 page piano reduction, but
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  he never got around to completing the orchestral
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  score. He left behind some 2 ,850 pages in orchestral
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  score before he died. So what about a Claudio
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  Colombo midi file of the heretics? I know where
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  the score is and I have this crazy idea that
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  I'm going to sight read through it one day. Anyway,
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  I'm just ranting about Gabriel von Vedich for
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  no apparent reason other than he wrote an eight
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  -hour opera that I really would love to see the
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  score to. But I'm digressing. Do go on Spotify
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  or Amazon Music or wherever you can find the
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  seemingly endless discography of Claudio Columbo.
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  It's a rather extraordinary achievement in its
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  way. So let's just leave it at that. This is
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  Jed Dissler, and you've been listening to the
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  Piano Maven, your friendly podcast guide to piano
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  recordings. I look forward to being with you
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  next time.