Franz Liszt (1811-86)

Started by Lethevich, September 28, 2008, 07:11:41 AM

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Mandryka

#380
Quote from: Moonfish on April 09, 2014, 11:37:51 PM
Being a big fan of Années de pèlerinage I am curious about which pianists GMG members listen to when it comes to Liszt. Personally I gravitate towards Berman, Bolet and Arrau. Still, which pianist do you view as having the recorded the most magical performance of Années de pèlerinage to date?



My favourite threnody pianist is Ervin Nyiregyhazi. If they're not on youtube let me know an I'll PM you the FLACs. For the Dante Sonata then I like Sofronitsky a lot, despite the bad sound. For the Petrarchan Sonets I would probably choose Weissenberg.

There's a live CD by Ogdon which is magical -- from a concrt in Japan. I can'rt recall if there's any Années in it.
Wovon man nicht sprechen kann, darüber muss man schweigen

Octave

#381
Quote from: Moonfish on April 09, 2014, 11:37:51 PM
Being a big fan of Années de pèlerinage I am curious about which pianists GMG members listen to when it comes to Liszt. Personally I gravitate towards Berman, Bolet and Arrau. Still, which pianist do you view as having the recorded the most magical performance of Années de pèlerinage to date?

I have spent the most time with your points of reference (though I think all I know of Arrau's is Books 1 & 2). 
I found Kempff's (incomplete) account really distinctive.  Likewise a Philips twofer with Brendel's Books 1/2 and Kocsis' Book 3.   (This latter, the Kocsis, was especially beautiful.)
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Octave

#382
Quote from: Mandryka on April 09, 2014, 11:46:19 PM
There's a live CD by Ogdon which is magical -- from a concrt in Japan. I can'rt recall if there's any Années in it.

I think I have heard of this one...is it this?


ASIN: B000BV7T3O  (apparently OOP, maybe in that forthcoming Sony collection, edit: it is.)

Except I am not sure this is a live one.
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Mandryka

Quote from: Octave on April 09, 2014, 11:55:51 PM
I think I have heard of this one...is it this?


ASIN: B000BV7T3O  (apparently OOP, maybe in that forthcoming Sony collection, edit: it is.)

Except I am not sure this is a live one.

Yes. That's the one.

I forgot to mention that another pianist I enjoy in the Annees is Jerome Lowenthal.

Wovon man nicht sprechen kann, darüber muss man schweigen

Karl Henning

Quote from: edward on April 09, 2014, 05:45:02 PM
Via crucis is absolutely astonishing, IMO.

Almost proto-Satie (OK, it's probably more to do with chant than Satie) and the DG box has a great recording of it under Reinbert de Leeuw.

Yes, an organic extension of plainchant . . . in comparison, though of a similar conception, the Duruflé Requiem (exquisite work that it is) appears almost heavy-handed.
Karl Henning, Ph.D.
Composer & Clarinetist
Boston MA
http://www.karlhenning.com/
[Matisse] was interested neither in fending off opposition,
nor in competing for the favor of wayward friends.
His only competition was with himself. — Françoise Gilot

Mandryka

The other religious choral thing that I like sometimes is the Requiem, I have a recording by the Hungarian Male People's Chorus. ANyway, I can assure you that when you're in the mood it's great fun even though more often as not it outstays its welcome.

I can't take Liszt seriously any more. I just listen to some of the Annees and I thought to myself that all those tremolos are just like my old auntie Edith -- she used to have candlesticks screwed onto the piano and antimacassars on the winged arm chairs and . . . 
Wovon man nicht sprechen kann, darüber muss man schweigen

Karl Henning

Quote from: Mandryka on April 10, 2014, 05:33:06 AM
I can't take Liszt seriously any more.

Thank you for conceding that the failing is yours.
Karl Henning, Ph.D.
Composer & Clarinetist
Boston MA
http://www.karlhenning.com/
[Matisse] was interested neither in fending off opposition,
nor in competing for the favor of wayward friends.
His only competition was with himself. — Françoise Gilot

Todd

Quote from: Moonfish on April 09, 2014, 11:37:51 PMStill, which pianist do you view as having the recorded the most magical performance of Années de pèlerinage to date?



While it's my newest version of the complete Annees, therefore meaning that it may just be enthusiasm for the new influencing my view, Mûza Rubackyté's recording is possibly my favorite.  She can and does play with outright virtuosity when needed, but a lot of her playing is delicate and beautiful.  Top flight sound helps, too.




Another modern recording of note is Bertrand Chamayou, whose style is sleek and virtuosic, and his playing and the recording make the work sound even larger in scale.  Among the old guard I've heard, Bolet is still magnificent.  I do wish he would have recorded the third book.
The universe is change; life is opinion. - Marcus Aurelius, Meditations

People would rather believe than know - E.O. Wilson

Propaganda death ensemble - Tom Araya

Dancing Divertimentian

Quote from: Moonfish on April 09, 2014, 11:37:51 PM
Being a big fan of Années de pèlerinage I am curious about which pianists GMG members listen to when it comes to Liszt. Personally I gravitate towards Berman, Bolet and Arrau. Still, which pianist do you view as having the recorded the most magical performance of Années de pèlerinage to date?

For Liszt in general the pianists I like are: Fiorentino, Richter, early Bolet (not the Decca Bolet), Cziffra, Kocsis, Ovchinnikov, Gilels, and Katchen.

As far as Arrau, I have his Transcendental Etudes but the sheer poetry of Bolet (1970) puts it atop my list for this work.

Berman's Années is good but for sizzling acrobatics and poetic daring a mixture of Fiorentino and Kocsis is my go-to.






[asin]B00ACCQXKM[/asin]

Veit Bach-a baker who found his greatest pleasure in a little cittern which he took with him even into the mill and played while the grinding was going on. In this way he had a chance to have the rhythm drilled into him. And this was the beginning of a musical inclination in his descendants. JS Bach

arkiv

Today, Franz Liszt died: 31th July, 1886.

Brian

Quote from: amw on February 12, 2015, 11:56:32 PM
Listened today from William Tell up to the end of the Dante Sonata. The rest tomorrow. Detailed comments eventually, but the music is surprisingly good. Better than I would have expected Liszt to be actually.
I'm having a Lisztaissance myself the past couple months, and Liszt's music is not the stupid pointless banging I remembered. Annees is really pretty extraordinary, and there are other great things too (Harmonies poétiques et religieuses, some late works). Bringing the Sergio Fiorentino 6CD Liszt box on a road trip starting today.

Looking forward to more of your comments.

Dax

Does anybody know of a good performance/recording of some of the psalms?

amw

Quote from: Brian on February 13, 2015, 09:13:33 AM
I'm having a Lisztaissance myself the past couple months, and Liszt's music is not the stupid pointless banging I remembered. Annees is really pretty extraordinary, and there are other great things too (Harmonies poétiques et religieuses, some late works). Bringing the Sergio Fiorentino 6CD Liszt box on a road trip starting today.

Looking forward to more of your comments.
Finished off with Venezia e Napoli and Book III today. Venezia e Napoli actually was my favourite part of the Années, until we got to Villa d'Este Threnody II (hey, someone actually made good music out of the Tristan theme! 8) Well, I suppose Berg did too, later on). But overall I would say the cycle displays better craftsmanship than's usually been ascribed to Liszt. I think I'll be checking out some more of his music now. (Again, detailed comments eventually. This is a placeholder.)

Michael Sayers

I am wondering if anyone here knows about the content of Franz Liszt's letters to Jessie Laussot.  I've tried without success to get a copy of this paper from two years ago, but maybe someone here has read it.

http://www.academia.edu/4760771/New_Liszt_Letters_to_Jessie_Laussot


Mvh,
Michael

San Antone

Quote from: Michael Sayers on June 09, 2015, 12:32:12 PM
I am wondering if anyone here knows about the content of Franz Liszt's letters to Jessie Laussot.  I've tried without success to get a copy of this paper from two years ago, but maybe someone here has read it.

http://www.academia.edu/4760771/New_Liszt_Letters_to_Jessie_Laussot


Mvh,
Michael

You can find some of them in Letters of Franz Liszt, Volume 2 - which has been uploaded into Google Books.

Michael Sayers

Quote from: sanantonio on June 09, 2015, 12:41:18 PM
You can find some of them in Letters of Franz Liszt, Volume 2 - which has been uploaded into Google Books.
Thanks Sanantonio!


Mvh,
Michael

Michael Sayers

What do you all think about Ervin Nyiregyhazi's playing of Liszt?  As an example, this is his recording of the B Minor Ballade:

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=g5XXiIxC73E


Mvh,
Michael

San Antone

Franz Liszt : Reconsidered



Franz Liszt's life would make a great movie.  He was arguably the greatest pianist in history, for many years he lived as a virtuoso performing all across Europe and having a few scandalous (for the period) love affairs in the process.  Then at the height of his fame, he retired abruptly from the concert stage choosing to live in partial seclusion devoted to composition and finally taking lower orders in the Catholic Church, ending his life as an Abbé.

Liszt was a tireless promoter of other composers, among them Wagner (especially during his long exile from Germany and its music scene), and Berlioz, as well as proselytizing styles from the past such as Bach's sacred music and Gregorian chant. His operatic transcriptions were a unique way of promoting new music and his piano reductions of Beethoven symphonies brought these works to places where they might not have been heard. Although he was a target in the so-called "music wars" of the 19th century, he was not a participant and was gracious when meeting with Brahms, much more so than Brahms was towards him.

His wrote some of the most technically demanding music for the piano, innovative music for orchestra, and spiritually sublime music for organ and choir.  His influence was huge, however, for decades his impact as a composer has been undervalued, if not ignored entirely.

RTRH

jlaurson

Quote from: sanantonio on June 10, 2015, 10:04:46 AM
Franz Liszt : Reconsidered

Franz Liszt's life would make a great movie. 

Liszt DID inspire movies... although not great movies, admittedly. There is one I saw, on allegedly the last usable print in existence, and with terrible decoloration into red, that was hilarious and lovely and had very little to do with Liszt's actual life... but it did have a soundtrack performed entirely by Jorge Bolet (!) and it featured Capucine, which makes any film very much worth watching.

Ah, yes: Song without End. https://youtu.be/aN57V6ZVtMs

San Antone

Quote from: jlaurson on June 11, 2015, 01:32:52 AM
Liszt DID inspire movies... although not great movies, admittedly. There is one I saw, on allegedly the last usable print in existence, and with terrible decoloration into red, that was hilarious and lovely and had very little to do with Liszt's actual life... but it did have a soundtrack performed entirely by Jorge Bolet (!) and it featured Capucine, which makes any film very much worth watching.

Ah, yes: Song without End. https://youtu.be/aN57V6ZVtMs

I thought there must have been but was too lazy to Google it. 

;)