In her heyday she was promoted as ‘the Neapolitan Horowitz’. Then I was blown away by a disc of Scarlatti sonatas whose fingerwork – flawlessly transparent at the speed of light – was unsurpassed by any of her rivals, including Horowitz. The answer lies in her phenomenal but idiosyncratic control of dynamics: perfect for her fellow Neapolitan Scarlatti but not so well suited to the master of Leipzig. And no one mastered more of those tricks than Maria Tipo, though she preferred to conjure with volume rather than tempo. We won’t hear the likes of Maria Tipo again.