Conlon Nancarrow wrote ‘can do’ music, which is oxymoronic considering it’s based on ‘can’t do’ performance realities. The set of 50 studies he wrote for player piano are 20th-century classics, and this German label uses the latest technology to produce a cycle that will surely be considered definitive.

The rationale behind Nancarrow’s music was to layer independent strands of material, creating textures of unheralded complexity which the player piano spits back at such crazy tempi his creations become like Sonic Fiction. This new cycle uses computer gizmos to ensure that the parts synchronise in exactly the ratios Nancarrow intended. The piano hammers are switched in favour of those the composer used, and the result is noticeably less honky-tonk and tinny than earlier incarnations.

Another advantage over Nancarrow’s five-volume set on Wergo is that the pieces are arranged chronologically, allowing listeners to gauge the development of his style. The stereotypical image of music sounding like five Art Tatums and a Thelonious Monk improvising eight-to-the-bar riffs simultaneously is an unfair reflection on its diversity, both in source material and gestural rhetoric. Some of the studies sound surprisingly austere and follow a contrapuntal trajectory between Bach and Stravinsky via Hindemith; while others are constructed around isolated, spacious flecks of sound. But it’s Nancarrow’s boogies-from-hell that will remain his trademark, and here the famous Etude No 3a runs at a faster tempo than previously while also benefiting from greater clarity. Roll on Volume 2!