http://www.comopianoacademy.org/about/
Studying their website, it all looks super-prestigious and beautiful, but what do they actually do, apart from making a lot of money? A handful of famous names for very limited masterclasses, but also some unknown ones like Katherina Chi or William Grant Nabore (?).
There must be hundreds of applicants every year who apply, paying $150 USD, but only 7 (!) each year are accepted at this “Academy”.
“Note: The application fee is not refundable.”
“An additional not refundable audition fee of $ 150 will be paid when the audition date is notified to the applicant.”
On the other hand, among the very few that did manage to be accepted in the 17 years of their existence, there are some pretty advanced, well-known pianists:
http://www.comopianoacademy.org/students/
Didn’t Lazar Berman hang out there in the 90s?
Wasn’t that Imola?
Checked their wiki. It looks more like an association than an academy.
It sounds like seven pianists annually are enrolled in a programme of sorts, where they can be coached by a number of professional pianists who visit Como but aren’t actually stationed there.
Right yes. Also no Lazar among the examples given on their wiki (if though a Boris).
Looks a bit like you buy a very expensive lottery ticket (note: there is also a potential audition, at the pianist’s cost), and if you win, you get probably some pretty decent teaching, plus contacts?
Strange, Boris Berman is not mentioned on their website.
I wonder how such tuition works for the students incidentally. Spending time with a single teacher for a year or so would likely have you absorb ideas and philosophies and make you grow in some direction, but if you just spend a week with 10 different star pianists over the course of a year… Wouldn’t they all pull you in different directions and just leave you confused?
This William Grant Naboré seems to be an important person in the whole thing though he’s totally unknown for me as a recording or performing pianist.
Maybe a past member, the wiki mentioned de Larrocha too who is dead since many years.
Exactly. Seems more a thing for an elite group of young, very advanced pianists who want to put the “Como experience” on their CV because it looks good and gives them connections, not because they learn a great deal of very useful things about musical interpretation or things about playing da 88 that they don’t already know yet.
HAHAHAH!!!
i predickt EVERY applicant vil pazz to da audition round 
Damnnn
Ahahaha dere wuz anotha mofo da CHIU who had a zimilah operation, but da GURU iz juz himzelf zo pracdickly no expenzez 
I rezheeyat da MT payin a few grand to get in
N da week-long top zecret zupah elite advanced mofo trainin cuntzizted of:
Learn n memorize a random zcar zon away from da 88, to be perf-ed at da end of da week
Few professions, even in the performing arts, simultaneously require the disciplined physical strength and precision, the intellectual multi-tasking and the emotional understanding and expression demanded of a pianist. Pianists can reap substantial benefits from their particular training, which touches on the three fundamental elements that form a person: the body, the heart and the mind. However, it is only by and deeply and consciously developing these three areas that pianists can achieve an internal equilibrium, which allows them to reach their true potential as artists and enjoy meaningful relationships with their audiences.
BZ level:
9 BARENz out of 10, REZPEC
Wut a eye-wateringly pretenziouz pontificasheeyat.
I’ll rephrase that more meaningfully and concisely.
PRAX
FUCK
READ
It sounds like he wants to sell classes. He’s on to something though - I really do think that becoming a successful classical pianist is among the most difficult things you can achieve. Even traditional genius professions like a mathematics professor, honestly - if you have an interest in math, capacity for learning and an active and intelligent mind, then off you go and you can be a mathematics professor. But with piano there are so many things which have to fall in place at the same time. Affinity, intelligence, learning etc is just one part of it.
So, wiz a bi-weekly trip to da Flushing, Queens (NYC) Chinese brothel, I can basically get da same value fo $120 a week (if I get da 2-chicks happy ending special)