This surprised me. I'm doing a little search into Chopin's hands and came onto a site hosting free piano recordings. No surprise there, but when I clicked on a mazurka, who do I hear? Yes, Chris, that's right, you! I recognize the sound of your piano anywhere, and so I clicked on some other mazurkas, and it's still you. Then I clicked on a nocturne and it's me! I think another pianist here is on another nocturne that I recognized too.

so are you saying that someone stole your recordings? Or is it another host website like "Classiccat"?

I guess 'steal' is the correct word. All of Chris' mazurkas are there, plus one of my nocturnes, the other pianist's on our site nocturne, and a bunch of etudes, which I don't have time to listen to them to see if I recognize any of our guys/girls, but I wouldn't be surprised. Our names are not listed with the files.

That's interesting! Could you post a link?

Yes, post that link please Monica.
Isn't Internet great... I even found a ringtone of one of my recordings

ok, here it is:

http://patina-di-musica.com/search.php? ... n&lang=eng

That's funny. I have found myself in various places too. Weird...

I just found my Fantaisie Impromptu there as well.

Interesting. I'm not offended by that the slightest bit though, since they are public domain pieces anyway. The only thing is I would have preferred they write my name as the pianist playing. Maybe it appears on the MP3 tag though, I didn't check. But that's no big deal for me.

It's a Japanese site, they seem to have ripped most or all of our recordings of standard repertoire. Indeed it would be ok if they had credited the performers. Strangely, recordings by Cortot are being credited. Hm. I'll try to get in touch with them and have a word. It may or may not help.....

> Indeed it would be ok if they had credited the performers.

I agree. But the downloads on that site are from their server or it's a link to pianosociety server?

All best,
Sandro

Thanks, Monica. I just took a short listen to that site and found a couple of Joplin Rags by yours truly. The Maple Leaf is not my playing, but I believe it's the very fast version on PS.

That's funny. It doesn't bother me, but I don't think it's ethical of someone to post our works without at least giving credit to the performers.

There are probably several more PS pianists on that site.

The "Carmen Variations" from PS are also on that site. This is going to go on and on and on and..............

I'm not offended by it, either. The only thing that bothers me is that of all the recordings I have up here, the person had to go take my 'crappy trills' nocturne. (not that Chopin is crappy - my trills are crappy)

Yep, that's my rag recording. I play it as written, "Tempo di Marcia". I guess I just walk faster than most people.

[quote="Sandro BisottiI agree. But the downloads on that site are from their server or it's a link to pianosociety server?[/quote]
That is part of the problem with it. Instead of linking to our site, they just rip all the files and make their own links. Classiccat always links to our pages, which is what we like and prefer.

I actively prevent linking directly from the site which they for sure have noticed. The reason is that I do not want to waste bandwidth on sites that even not credit us but this is a bit more problematic as they have actually first downloaded the file and then put it up on their site.

I tried to click the links of a couple of mazurkas but it says "Sorry, I can't show this page. Because, this mp3 file might violate copyright." Have you been in contact with them Chris?

This has happened several times before and every time you find sites like this, let me know and I will send them an email or two (always in friendly mood to make them feel bad ).