Information AboutFranz Liszt |
Franz Liszt ( Pianist and Composer of the Romantic period. He was a renowned performer throughout Europe during the 19th century, noted especially for his showmanship and great skill with the piano. Today, he is considered to be one of the greatest pianists in history. Liszt is frequently credited with re-defining piano playing itself, and his influence is still visible today, both through his compositions and his legacy as a teacher. He is credited with the invention of the Symphonic Poem , as well as the modern solo piano Recital , in which his virtuosity won him approval by composers and performers alike. OVERVIEW He also contributed greatly toward the Romantic idiom in general. His writings and philosophies about the nature of music as an art, the role of the artist, and the necessary future direction of music had a significant effect on the musical culture of the time. His great generosity with both time and money benefited many people, including victims of disasters, orphans, and the many students he taught for free. He was also a benefactor and advocate of many composers, most famously Richard Wagner and Hector Berlioz . Many of his piano compositions have entered the standard repertoire, including the Hungarian Rhapsodies , Transcendental Etudes (''Études d'exécution transcendante''), Années De Pèlerinage (Years of Pilgrimage), the Piano Sonata In B Minor , and two Piano Concerto s. He also made many piano Transcriptions of Opera s, famous Symphonies , Paganini Caprices (some of the most demanding works of the violin repertoire in his day), and Schubert Lied er. Many of his piano compositions are among the most technically challenging in the repertoire. Liszt was also a composer of Lieder and choral music, of symphonic poems and other orchestral works. He also wrote for the organ, and his compositions for that instrument are lauded and well-established in the organ repertoire. BIOGRAPHY Liszt was born in the village of Doborján (now Raiding , Austria ) in Hungary (then part of the Habsburg Empire ), near Sopron . His Catholic baptism record records his first name as ''Franciscus'' (the latinized version of Franz). His parents were Adam and Maria Anna Liszt (née Lager). Franz was a weak and sickly child, and was surrounded from his early childhood with music. His father, who worked at the court of Prince Esterházy , was himself a pianist and cellist who used to play in Esterházy's summer orchestra in Eisenstadt ; he organized chamber music evenings with amateur musicians from the surrounding villages in which his old friends from Eisenstadt occasionally took part. Franz received his first music lessons from his father when he was six years old. He quickly displayed incredible talent, easily Sight-reading the most difficult music he could find, often even reading multiple staves at once. Local aristocrats noticed his talent and enabled him to travel to Vienna and later to Paris with his family. In Vienna he was taught by Beethoven's student Carl Czerny , who proved to be the only professional piano teacher Liszt ever had. His father had first taken him to be taught by Johann Nepomuk Hummel , but Hummel's fees were too high. Antonio Salieri taught him the technique of composition and fostered the young Liszt's musical taste. He formed an early friendship with Frédéric Chopin , but later fierce competition turned the two men into rivals. He was a lifelong friend of Camille Saint-Saëns , and the latter dedicated his ''"Organ Symphony"'' (Symphony No. 3 In C Minor) to Liszt. Although he always considered himself a Hungarian, Liszt never became fluent in the Hungarian Language ; his later letters and diaries show that he came to regret this deeply. One letter to his mother begins in faltering Hungarian, and after an apology continues in French (his preferred language). On April 13 , 1823 , Liszt gave a concert at which, according to legend, he impressed Beethoven to such an extent that he personally congratulated Liszt, kissing him on the forehead and giving him enthusiastic praise. But as Beethoven was already completely deaf by then, the story would seem to be apocryphal. Years of pilgrimage Liszt left and Daniel. , 1832]] He fraternized with such noted composers of his time as Frédéric Chopin , Hector Berlioz , Robert Schumann , and Richard Wagner , who later married Liszt's daughter Cosima. He was very widely read in philosophy, art and literature and was on friendly terms with the painter Ingres and the authors Heine , Lamennais , Hans Christian Andersen , and Baudelaire , who addressed his prose poem " Le Thyrse " to Liszt. In 1840-1841 Liszt took part in two tours of the British Isles arranged by the young musician and conductor Lewis Henry Lavenu , accompanied by Lavenu's half-brother (and pupil of Sigismond Thalberg ) Frank Mori, two female singers, and John Orlando Parry, a musician, singer and entertainer (who vividly recorded the tour in his diary). Between August 17 and September 26 , they gave 50 concerts around England some of which had an attendance of 140 or less. The second tour which encompassed Liverpool, Ireland and Scotland from November 1840- January 1841 attracted even smaller audiences, although Liszt had audiences of more than 1,200 in Dublin . The tour was a financial failure, and Liszt himself lost a large amount of moneypp.55-59 ''Liszt, Master Musicians Series'', 2007, Derek Watson . After 1842, when "Lisztomania" swept across the European continent, Liszt's recitals were in an overwhelming demand. His admirers praised and courted him, and ladies reputedly fought over his handkerchiefs and green silk gloves as souvenirs, which they often ripped to pieces in their struggle. Some of Liszt's contemporaries saw this kind of worship as vulgar and inappropriate, and eventually came to despise Liszt because of it. During the years in which he appeared regularly in public, he was almost universally acknowledged (even by musical conservatives who disliked his compositions) as the foremost piano performer. His main rival in public esteem as a virtuoso was Sigismond Thalberg , who specialized in Salon Music , especially operatic fantasies. Thalberg's reputation has faded, and in current opinion, only Chopin is comparably significant among romantic pianists. Liszt in Weimar In 1847, Liszt gave up public performances on the piano and in the following year finally took up the invitation of Grand Duchess Maria Pavlovna Of Russia to settle at Weimar , where he had been appointed Kapellmeister Extraordinaire in 1842, remaining there until 1861. During this period he acted as conductor at court concerts and on special occasions at the theatre, gave lessons to a number of pianists, including the great virtuoso Hans Von Bülow , who married Liszt's daughter Cosima in 1857 (before she was married to Wagner ). He also wrote articles championing Berlioz and Wagner , and produced those orchestral and choral pieces upon which his reputation as a composer mainly rests. His efforts on behalf of Wagner, who was then an exile in Switzerland, culminated in the first performance of '' Lohengrin '' in 1850. Among his compositions written during his time at Weimar are the two piano concertos, No. 1 In E Flat Major and No. 2 In A Major , the ''Totentanz'' , the '' Concerto Pathetique '' for two pianos, the Piano Sonata In B Minor , a number of Etudes, fifteen Hungarian Rhapsodies , twelve orchestral Symphonic Poem s, the Faust Symphony , and Dante Symphony , the 13th Psalm for tenor solo, chorus and orchestra, the choruses to Herder's dramatic scenes ''Prometheus'', and the ''Graner Fest Messe''. Much of Liszt's organ music also comes from this period, including the well-known Prelude And Fugue On The Theme B-A-C-H (later arranged for solo piano). Also in 1847, while touring in Russia, Liszt met Princess Carolyne Zu Sayn-Wittgenstein . The Princess was an author, whose major work was published in 16 volumes, each containing over 1,600 pages. Her longwinded writing style had some effect on Liszt himself. His biography of Chopin and his chronology and analysis of Gypsy music were both written in the Princess's loquacious style. The couple had intended to marry in 1860, but since the Princess had been previously married and her husband was still alive, the Roman Catholic authorities would not approve the wedding, eventually intervening in dramatic fashion only moments before the couple were to take their vows. Although Liszt and Princess Carolyne remained friends, the stress of trying to persuade the Church authorities to let them marry, only to have their efforts eventually be in vain, proved an emotional blow from which neither completely recovered. In 1851 he published a revised version of his 1837 Douze Grandes Etudes, now titled ''Etudes d'Execution Transcendante'', and the following year the '' Grandes Etudes De Paganini '' (Grand etudes after Paganini), the most famous of which is '' La Campanella '' (The Little Bell), a study in octaves, trills and leaps. In retirement Liszt moved to Rome in 1861, in anticipation of his marriage to Princess Sayn-Wittgenstein. In 1865, he received the tonsure and four Minor Orders of the Catholic Church (namely, Porter , Lector , Exorcist , and Acolyte ). From 1869 onwards, Abbé Liszt divided his time between Rome, Weimar and Budapest where during the summer months he continued to receive pupils for free, including Alexander Siloti . During this time, his relationship with Wagner grew more strained. His daughter Cosima (see previous section) left Bülow for Wagner in 1869. Devout Catholic that he was, he was deeply hurt by his daughter's conversion to Protestantism upon her marriage to Wagner, and for a number of years, Liszt did not correspond with either, even while championing the music of his new son-in-law. Eventually, they were reconciled and Liszt subsequently attended the Bayreuth Festival . From 1876 until his death he also taught for several months every year at the Hungarian Conservatoire at Budapest. He died in Bayreuth on July 31 1886 as a result of Pneumonia which he contracted during the Bayreuth Festival hosted by his daughter Cosima. At first, he was surrounded by some of his more adoring pupils, including Arthur Friedheim , Siloti and Bernhard Stavenhagen , but they were denied access to his room by Cosima shortly before his death at 11:30pm. He is buried in the Bayreuth Friedhof. MUSICAL STYLE AND INFLUENCE Liszt was a prolific composer. Most of his music is for the piano and much of it requires formidable technique. His thoroughly revised masterwork, '' Années De Pèlerinage '' ("Years of Pilgrimage") arguably includes his most provocative and stirring pieces. This set of three suites ranges from the pure virtuosity of the Suisse ''Orage'' (Storm) to the subtle and imaginative visualizations of artworks by Michaelangelo and Raphael in the second set. ''Années'' contains some pieces which are loose transcriptions of Liszt's own earlier compositions; the first "year" recreates his early pieces of '' Album D'un Voyageur '', while the second book includes a resetting of his own song transcriptions once separately published as '' Tre Sonetti Di Petrarca '' ("Three sonnets of Petrarch "). The relative obscurity of the vast majority of his works may be explained by the immense number of pieces he composed. In his most famous and virtuosic works, he is the archetypal Romantic composer. Liszt pioneered the technique of thematic transformation, a method of development which was related to both the existing is a single-movement orchestral work usually based on a literary work or a character sketch. Liszt's inspiration came from classical literature, including " Ce Qu'on Entend Sur La Montagne ," based on a Victor Hugo poem of the same title, and " Les Préludes " from Lamartine . Other pieces are based on works by Lord Byron, Goethe and Dante. Liszt's symphonic poems represent his ideal and philosophy of "The Music of the Future", in which music and art and literature would all join together in a grand synthesis. Although the symphonic poems were generally successes, they were often criticised by those who preferred the traditional Absolute Music as exemplified by Johannes Brahms . His transcriptions met with less criticism. As a transcriber of even the most unlikely and complicated orchestral works, he created piano arrangements which stood on their own merits; many other pianist-composers followed his example. His piano works have always been well represented in concert programs and recordings by pianists throughout the world. Many of his works have been recorded a multitude of times. However, the only pianist who has recorded his entire pianistic oeuvre is the Australian Leslie Howard . The project took almost 15 years to complete, and comprised 95 full-length CDs. Howard was awarded a place in the Guinness Book of Records for having completed the largest recording project ever in the history of music (including both pop and classical). The series has also earned several Gramophone Grands Prix du Disque, and a special award from the Hungarian government. This massive undertaking included a number of premiere recordings, including many unpublished pieces, recorded from manuscript, which had not been played by anyone since Liszt himself. Late works Later works of the composer such as Bagatelle Sans Tonalité ("Bagatelle without Tonality") foreshadow composers who would further explore the modern concept of Atonality . Although in his later years his compositional style became less overtly virtuosic, it also became more experimental harmonically. A famous example of this later style is '' Nuages Gris ''; it can also be seen to some extent in the third volume of the '' Années De Pèlerinage ''. Liszt's work also foreshadowed the Impressionism that would characterize the work of Debussy and Ravel , as shown in '''Les Jeux d'Eaux à la Villa d'Este'' (The Fountains of the Villa D'Este ) from the third volume of ''Années de Pèlerinage''. As Alan Walker writes in his volume covering Liszt's late years, it can be tempting to think of Liszt as the father of modern music on the basis of his late music. From our vantage point, it would seem that his experiments in harmony, his audacious handling of musical form, his unparalleled ability to draw strange sounds from the concert grand, would all apparenltly confirm that Liszt was one of the true revolutionaries in music. But to look at these achievements as ends in themselves would be erroneous.Walker, Alan, ''Liszt: The Final Years, 1861-1886'' (Cornell University Press, 1997), p. 437. Liszt's technical achievements in his late music is one side of a more complex picture. By the early 1880s, Liszt was often ravaged by a universal sadness, descending without warning and threatening to overwhelm everything he did. He told Lina Ramann, "I carry with me a deep sadness of the heart which must now and then break out in sound."Walker,'' Liszt: The Final Years'', pp. 437-438. Liszt wrestled daily with the demons of desolation, despair and death, bringing forth music that utterly failed to find its audience. We now know, in retrospect, that Liszt's contemporaries were offered a glimpse into a mind on the verge of catastrophe. They formed what Bence Szabolcsi calls "a consipracy of silence" on the late pieces — one not lifted until modern times.Walker, ''Liszt: The Final Years'', p. 438. Liszt's works from this period fall into three categories:
The first category contains pieces in which a troubled spirit seeks consolation in memories of the past. Liszt referred to this music as his "forgotten" pieces — sardonically referring to compositions forgotten before even played, with titles such as ''Valse oubliée'', ''Polka oubliée'' and ''Romance oubliée''.Walker, ''Liszt: The Final Years'', p. 438. The second category, music of despair, can appear much more important since the titles of the pieces in this category would seem to point to a troubled mind. These titles include:
These pieces, as well as others in this category, can be best understood as fragments broken off from a greater whole, each offering a glimpse of a pathology of despair. Though they do not share any overtly musical connections, they seem to fit with one another like members of a large family who never settle on one place yet become acquainted through chance encounters at smaller gatherings.Walker, ''Liszt: The Final Years'', p. 438. The third category, music of death, contains pieces where Liszt raised grief to high art. Memorials, elegies, funerals and other aspects of the grieving process find their place in this music. Again, a sampling of titles in this grouping:
#Széchenyi Isván (Lament) #Eötvös Jôzsef #Vörösmarty Mihály #Teleki László (Funeral Music) #Deák Ferenc #Petõfi Sándor (In Memory of) #Monsoni Mihály (Funeral Music)
Liszt once referred to his works in this category as his "mortuary pieces," perhaps as a joke intended to deflect criticism. As Walker puts it: "These pieces reveal a soul in turmoil. Since that is also a part of the human condition, there can be something here for all of us".Walker, ''Liszt: The Final Years'', p. 439 Liszt School, Weimar Liszt helped found the '' in Budapest . Throughout his later years Liszt took on many private students and his influence as a pedagogue was immense. Among his students were Eugen D'Albert , Arthur Friedheim , Sophie Menter , Moriz Rosenthal , Emil Von Sauer , and Alexander Siloti . Liszt's virtuosity and technical innovations Liszt's playing was described as theatrical and showy, and all those who saw him perform were stunned at his unrivalled mastery over the piano. Perhaps the best indication of Liszt's piano-playing abilities comes from his Douze Grandes Etudes and early Paganini Studies, written in 1837 and 1838 respectively, and described by Schumann as "studies in storm and dread designed to be performed by, at most, ten or twelve players in the world". To play these pieces, a pianist must connect with the piano as an extension of his own body (Walker, 1987). Liszt claimed to have spent ten or twelve hours each day practising scales, arpeggios, trills and repeated notes to improve his technique and endurance. All of these piano techniques were frequently applied in his compositions, often resulting in music of extreme technical difficulty (his Transcendental Etude No.5 "Feux follets" is an example). He would challenge himself and his immaculate fingering by presenting random problems to his playing. Perhaps a large contributing factor to Liszt's affinity for extreme technical difficulty was the structure of his own hands. An original 19th century plaster cast of Liszt's right hand has been reproduced, and is now held in the Liszt House at Marienstrasse 17 (also known as the Liszt Museum). The plaster cast reveals that while Liszt's fingers were undoubtedly slender, they were of no exceptionally abnormal length. However, the small "webbing" connectors found between the fingers of any normal hand were practically nonexistent for Liszt. This allowed the composer to cover a much wider span of notes than the average pianist, perhaps even up to 12 whole steps. During the 1830s and 1840s — the years of Liszt's "transcendental execution" — he revolutionised piano technique in almost every sector. Figures like Rubinstein , Paderewski and Rachmaninoff turned to Liszt's music to discover the laws which govern the keyboard. While revolutionary and famously spectacular, Liszt's playing was far from mere flash and acrobatics. He also was reported to have played with a depth and nobility of feeling that would move sturdy men to tears. It seems that this quality to his playing may have continued to develop during his life, overtaking the youthful fire and bravura. Indeed, reports of his playing in old age include observations that it was surprisingly and distinctly subtle and poetic, with great purity of tone and effortlessness of execution; in distinction to the more tumultuous "Liszt school" of playing, which by then had already started to become traditional in Europe. Examination of the late piano works seems to back up this expressive requirement, where the composer seems to be deliberately rejecting the showiness of his earlier works. Liszt was also a brilliant sight reader and stunned Edvard Grieg in the 1870s by playing his Piano Concerto perfectly by sight. The year before, Liszt played Grieg's violin sonata from sight. Decades earlier Liszt had played Chopin's studies at sight, prompting Chopin to write that he was consumed by envy, and wished to steal from Liszt his manner of playing his own pieces. This is all the more remarkable when one remembers that Liszt was playing at sight from a hand-written manuscript. Piano recital The term recital was first used by Liszt at his concert in London of June 9 1840 , although the term had been suggested to him by the publisher Frederick Beale, and his career model is still followed by performing artists to this day. Before Liszt no one had given a piano-only concert. There would always have been a chamber work, or some songs too. It was Liszt who elevated the piano to its status today, and who demonstrated that a satisfying concert can be given by the piano alone. Liszt's recitals traversed the European continent from the Urals to Ireland. He would often play before as many as three thousand people. He was the first solo pianist to play entire programmes from memory, and the first to play with the piano at right angles to the platform, with its lid open, reflecting sound across the auditorium. NOTED WORKS For a full list of works, see main articles: List Of Compositions By Franz Liszt (S.1 - S.350) and also (S.351 - S.999) inspired Liszt to write a piano piece called "Fountains of the Villa d'Este". The villa and the portrait of the composer can be seen in the same image made by István Orosz ]] Although Liszt provided Opus Number s for some of his earlier works, they are rarely used today. Instead, his works are usually identified using one of two different cataloging schemes:
Works with Opus numbers Works from his childhood
These above works were published 1825, Opus number 5 was left unused.
Works from his youth
Works without Opus numbers (selection)
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