Franz Liszt (1811-86)

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

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karlhenning

I dig the Noseda. But if the Lehel may be even wilder . . . .

; )

abidoful

So much enthusiasm for Liszt's magnum opuses---I love this forum :)

Cato

Quote from: Luke on May 10, 2011, 11:18:01 AM
Don't give me ideas!!

Famously, it is a twelve tone row, of a sort, yes, though obviously not treated as such. It's really a kind of mystical, alchemical object, of the kind Busoni (another Faust devotee) would later use - the twelve tones representing science/mathematics/secret knowledge (just like another pre-Schoenbergian almost-but-not-quite 'twelve tone row', that of the 'Science' fugue in Strauss's Also sprach Zarathustra). But also important is that the Liszt theme is pattern of chromatically descending augmented triads - again, there's a kind of constructivist, synthetic, Scriabinesque mysticism to that, I think.

'Tis me doody t' give ye ideers!   $:)

Liszt the Mystic is quite appropriate of course for the Abbe'. 

Some years ago, while at the University of Nebraska, I came across a Liszt expert.  He has several essays of interest on-line:

See:
http://www.paulbarnes.net/sacra-bridge.html

An excerpt:

QuoteComposed in 1853, Liszt's B Minor Sonata has long been a tour de force among pianists and remains an indispensable part of the pianist's repertoire.   The form of this giant thirty minute work is both unique and ambiguous.  Rather than constructing a typical multi-movement sonata typical of the sonatas composed in the eighteenth and early nineteenth centuries, Liszt creates a gigantic one movement form that contains all the basic elements of the multi- movement sonata cycle.   Yet there is little that is neat and contained or totally satisfying about any particular analysis of this great work.  This is one reason that musicologists are still inspired to add their "new" analyses to an ever-growing list of noble attempts.  Yet no one issue related to the Sonata ignites greater passion than the idea that the 'sonata', a term used to denote "absolute" music with no external program, might actually contain extra musical references.  It is this writer's contention that the sonata is in fact a gloriously vague hybrid of both the "absolute" sonata and the epic tone poem, a programmatic form for which Liszt is given credit for inventing.  Given Liszt's remarkably articulate views on the sacramental nature and social purpose of music, it would seem most natural to search for a programmatic meaning to such a monumental composition. 

My emphasis above.

See also:

http://www.paulbarnes.net/liszt.htm
"Meet Miss Ruth Sherwood, from Columbus, Ohio, the Middle of the Universe!"

- Brian Aherne introducing Rosalind Russell in  My Sister Eileen (1942)

J.Z. Herrenberg

Quote from: Luke on May 10, 2011, 06:25:15 AM
Isn't it, though! There is a great deal of subtlety in this piece too, especially in the slower, more ellusive music - rhythmically, with those quintuple and septuple metres, and texturally too, in the central portions of the Inferno and in much of the rest. It's only, really, the brazenly hellish outer sections of that movement which could potentially offend against taste and decency!


Like the Joycean slip.
Music gives a soul to the universe, wings to the mind, flight to the imagination and life to everything. -- Plato

Luke

I always get that one wrong!  ;D

karlhenning

Haitink or Masur better in the tone-poems?

Luke


karlhenning

I've had a reissue of Masur doing nos. 2-4 & 6, with which I have no quarrel.  I've been tempted by the 4-CD reissue of Haitink/London Phil.  Well, tempted is certainly past tense, I've gone ahead and plunged.

Sergeant Rock

Quote from: Luke on May 11, 2011, 04:29:09 AM
Masur gets my vote

Between Masur and Haitink, yes, Masur. However, someone recommended Arpad Joo's cycle with the Budapest SO on Hungaroton and that doesn't disappoint either.


Sarge
the phone rings and somebody says,
"hey, they made a movie about
Mahler, you ought to go see it.
he was as f*cked-up as you are."
                               --Charles Bukowski, "Mahler"

Sergeant Rock

Quote from: k a rl h e nn i ng on May 11, 2011, 04:44:06 AM
I've had a reissue of Masur doing nos. 2-4 & 6, with which I have no quarrel.  I've been tempted by the 4-CD reissue of Haitink/London Phil.  Well, tempted is certainly past tense, I've gone ahead and plunged.

I'm not unhappy with the set as a whole. Haitink is good in the more reticent music but is let down, I think, by the sound engineer in the more extrovert passages (timpani recessed and lacking impact in Les préludes, for example).

Sarge
the phone rings and somebody says,
"hey, they made a movie about
Mahler, you ought to go see it.
he was as f*cked-up as you are."
                               --Charles Bukowski, "Mahler"

Scarpia

#250
Quote from: Sergeant Rock on May 11, 2011, 04:51:29 AM
I'm not unhappy with the set as a whole. Haitink is good in the more reticent music but is let down, I think, by the sound engineer in the more extrovert passages (timpani recessed and lacking impact in Les préludes, for example).

But the brass is so beautifully recorded.  The Timpani can always be reinforced by stamping the feet while listening to the recording.

karlhenning

Quote from: Il Barone Scarpia on May 11, 2011, 05:57:34 AM
. . . The Timpani can always be reinforced by stamping the feed while listening to the recording.

I do that all the time, anyway (Oh, I kid, I kid) . . . .

J.Z. Herrenberg

Quote from: Sergeant Rock on May 11, 2011, 04:47:06 AM
Between Masur and Haitink, yes, Masur. However, someone recommended Arpad Joo's cycle with the Budapest SO on Hungaroton and that doesn't disappoint either.


It was reissued in a Brilliant box, which I have. It is indeed excellent.
Music gives a soul to the universe, wings to the mind, flight to the imagination and life to everything. -- Plato

abidoful

Did Karajan make a recording of the Faust-Symphony?

Scarpia

Quote from: James on May 15, 2011, 07:05:25 AM

Liszt's grand and spectacular music brings out the best in Karajan and his orchestra - this is one of his most exciting recordings, and in the closing measures the music simply tears of the page. This two-disc set is an excellent introduction to Liszt's large-scale work.

This recordings are quite nice, but Karajan's earlier Philharmonia recordings on EMI are a notch above, to my ears anyway.


zamyrabyrd

Quote from: James on May 15, 2011, 07:05:25 AM
Liszt can be credited with inventing the genre of the symphonic poem, and extended orchestral piece presented as the interpretation of a non-musical subject.

Doesn't Roméo et Juliette by Berlioz count as a symphonic poem?

Also somewhat in opposition to another post a couple pages ago, Liszt had plenty of trouble with acceptance of his orchestral music by his peers, so much that at times he was loathe to present it in public. (Re: The 2nd volume of Alan Walker's biography, "Franz Liszt" - which by the way, all three volumes are an excellent read about his life and music, with plenty of historical background.)
ZB
"Men, it has been well said, think in herds; it will be seen that they go mad in herds, while they only recover their senses slowly, one by one."

― Charles MacKay, Extraordinary Popular Delusions and the Madness of Crowds

Scarpia

Quote from: zamyrabyrd on May 15, 2011, 07:46:20 AM
Doesn't Roméo et Juliette by Berlioz count as a symphonic poem?

or Beethoven's 6th, Mendelssohn Midsummer Night's Dream, Calm Sea and Prosperous Voyage, or Fingal's Cave.  If Liszt can claim anything it would be naming the existing genre "symphonic poem."

abidoful

Quote from: James on May 15, 2011, 07:05:25 AM



SO that recording above is A COMPLETE (excludind the piano-orchestra works?) RECORDING OF LISZT'S ORCHESTRAL WORKS then?

Scarpia

Quote from: abidoful on May 15, 2011, 08:13:57 AM
SO that recording above is A COMPLETE (excludind the piano-orchestra works?) RECORDING OF LISZT'S ORCHESTRAL WORKS then?

No.  That is a single CD.  I think this one contains all of Karajan's Liszt recordings on DG, but is not nearly "complete."

[asin]B000009CMQ[/asin]

abidoful

Thanks!
I also did the "sensible" thing and checked that karajan recording myself.
It contains the following works (in two discs);
- Mefisto-Waltz nr1 (was it originally an orchestral work, or a solo piano, anyone? It's very famous among pianists!)
- Les Preludes
- Fantasia on Hungarian Folk Tunes (with piano)
- Hungarian Rhapsody nr 5 (and what's the sory of this? I thought the Hungarian Rhapsodies were solo piano pieces...  ???)
- MAZEPPA
- Hungarian Rhapsody nr 4
- Tasso. Lamento e Trionfo
- Hungarian Rhapsody nr 2