Federico Colli - JS Bach/Busoni

The Guardian 100

(Chandos)
Playing on a modern Steinway, the Italian pianist invests Bach’s keyboard works with vitality and a memorable soft-edged inwardness

Last year, the young Italian pianist Federico Colli made waves with a disc of Scarlatti subtitled “Volume 1”, which might have seemed to promise that he would be occupied with that composer’s 500-plus sonatas for some time. Instead, however, he has diverted his attention to JS Bach, and gratifyingly too, as even in such well-worn repertoire he has a lot to say.

Not for Colli the constraints of performing on an instrument of Bach’s time – he has tried those for research, but compared it to driving a Fiat 500 when you have a Lamborghini waiting in the garage. So he plays on a modern Steinway; and yet there is a percussive quality to his touch that means that when he rattles winningly through the outer movements of the Italian Concerto, with entirely natural fluency, you can almost hear how they would sound on a harpsichord.