Franz Liszt (1811-1886) - Concerto (Es-Dur) per pianoforte, S.124
Performers: Bertrand Chamayou (fortepiano, 1837); Le Cercle de l'Harmonie; Jérémie Rhorer (conductor)
Further info: Concertos–E♭ major
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Hungarian composer, pianist and teacher. Son of Ádám Liszt (1776-1827)
and Maria Anna Lager (1788-1866), his father was an amateur musician who
devoted his energies to the education of his son. At the age of 9,
young Liszt was able to play a difficult piano concerto by Ferdinand
Ries. A group of Hungarian music-lovers provided sufficient funds to
finance Liszt's musical education. In 1822 the family traveled to
Vienna. Beethoven was still living, and Liszt's father bent every effort
to persuade Beethoven to come to young Liszt's Vienna concert on April
13, 1823. Legend has it that Beethoven did come and was so impressed
that he ascended the podium and kissed the boy on the brow. There is
even in existence a lithograph that portrays the scene, but it was made
many years after the event by an unknown lithographer and its
documentary value is dubious. Liszt himself perpetuated the legend, and
often showed the spot on his forehead where Beethoven was supposed to
have implanted the famous kiss. However that might be, Liszt's
appearance in Vienna created a sensation; he was hailed by the press as
'child Hercules'. He met and studied with Carl Czerny and Antonio
Salieri. Salieri appealed to Prince Esterhazy for financial help so as
to enable Liszt to move to Vienna, where Salieri made his residence.
Apparently Esterhazy was sufficiently impressed with Salieri's plea to
contribute support. Under the guidance of his ambitious father, Liszt
applied for an entrance examination at the Paris Conservatory, but its
director, Luigi Cherubini, declined to accept him, ostensibly because he
was a foreigner. Liszt then settled for private lessons in counterpoint
from Antoine Reicha. Liszt remained in Paris, where he soon joined the
brilliant company of men and women of the arts. Paganini's spectacular
performances of the violin in particular inspired Liszt to emulate him
in creating a piano technique of transcendental difficulty and
brilliance, utilizing all possible sonorities of the instrument.
Handsome and a brilliant conversationalist, Liszt was sought after in
society. His first lasting attachment was with an aristocratic married
woman, the Comtesse Marie d'Agoult; they had 3 daughters, one of whom,
Cosima Liszt (1837-1930), married Liszt's friend Hans von Bulow before
abandoning him for Richard Wagner. His second and final attachment was
with another married woman, Carolyne von Sayn-Wittgenstein, who was
separated from her husband. Her devotion to Liszt exceeded all limits,
even in a Romantic age. Liszt fully intended to marry Sayn-Wittgenstein,
but he encountered resistance from the Catholic church, to which they
both belonged and which forbade marriage to a divorced woman. His own
position as a secular cleric further militated against it. Thus, Liszt,
the great lover of women, never married. Liszt's romantic infatuations
did not interfere with his brilliant virtuoso career. One of his
greatest successes was his triumphant tour in Russia in 1842. Russian
musicians and music critics exhausted their flowery vocabulary to praise
him as the miracle of the age. Czar Nicholas I himself attended a
concert in St. Petersburg, and expressed his appreciation by sending him
a pair of trained Russian bears. Liszt acknowledged the imperial honor,
but did not venture to take the animals with him on his European tour.
It is not clear why, after all his triumphs in Russia and elsewhere in
Europe, he decided to abandon his career as a piano virtuoso and devote
his entire efforts to composition. He became associated with Wagner as a
prophet of 'music of the future'. In 1848 he accepted the position of
Court Kapellmeister in Weimar. As a composer, he made every effort to
expand the technical possibilities of piano technique; in his piano
concertos, and particularly in his Etudes d'execution transcendante, he
made use of the grand piano, which expanded the keyboard in both the
bass and the extreme treble. He also extended the field of piano
literature with his brilliant transcriptions of operas. Although Liszt
is universally acknowledged to be a great Hungarian composer, he was
actually brought up in the atmosphere of German culture.
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