Franz Liszt - A Critical Discography

[San Antone]

As I am editing my main text, and comparing it to other sources for completeness, I sometimes find a recording that slipped through the cracks.  Usually these are yet another good but not great performance; not so with the one by Gina Bachauer from 1954.



Gina Bachauer
EMI/HMV CLP 1057 (1954)
Greek pianist. Her father was from an Austrian family which had settled in Greece in 1877, while her mother came from near Trieste. Bachauer studied at the Athens Conservatory under Woldemar Freeman and later at the Ecole Normale, Paris, with Cortot. Freeman introduced her to Rachmaninoff, with whom she also took lessons. Her French solo début took place in the Salle Chopin, Paris, in 1929, and she first played in England in 1932 at the Aeolian Hall, London. In 1933 she won the medal of honour at an international piano competition in Vienna, and in the 1930s played concertos with the Paris SO conducted by Monteux and the Athens SO under Mitropoulos. For several years following her marriage in 1936 to John Christodoulo she lived in Alexandria, giving over 600 concerts for allied troops in various parts of northern Egypt during World War II. In 1946 she made her British orchestral début at the Albert Hall, London, playing Grieg's Piano Concerto with the New London Orchestra under Alec Sherman. Following her American début at New York's Town Hall in 1950, she undertook many coast-to-coast tours of the USA. After the death of her first husband she married Alec Sherman in 1951.

Bachauer was at her most formidable in the 19th- and early 20th-century repertory, impressing with the strength and breadth of her keyboard command and essentially balanced musicianship. Her recordings of concertos by Beethoven, Brahms, Chopin and Grieg, as well as solo works by Debussy, Ravel and Stravinsky, have been re-issued on compact disc.

This is an amazing performance of the sonata.  Gina Bachauer was a well-known and respected concert pianist during the mid-20th century, but has become largely forgotten today, which is exceedingly unfortunate.  Much of her discography is out of print, and only a few LPs made it to digital transfer.  However, the level of her playing was very high and I would like to see all of them, this one in particular, re-issued.

[kishnevi]

As I am editing my main text, and comparing it to other sources for completeness, I sometimes find a recording that slipped through the cracks.  Usually these are yet another good but not great performance; not so with the one by Gina Bachauer from 1954.



Gina Bachauer
EMI/HMV CLP 1057 (1954)
Greek pianist. Her father was from an Austrian family which had settled in Greece in 1877, while her mother came from near Trieste. Bachauer studied at the Athens Conservatory under Woldemar Freeman and later at the Ecole Normale, Paris, with Cortot. Freeman introduced her to Rachmaninoff, with whom she also took lessons. Her French solo début took place in the Salle Chopin, Paris, in 1929, and she first played in England in 1932 at the Aeolian Hall, London. In 1933 she won the medal of honour at an international piano competition in Vienna, and in the 1930s played concertos with the Paris SO conducted by Monteux and the Athens SO under Mitropoulos. For several years following her marriage in 1936 to John Christodoulo she lived in Alexandria, giving over 600 concerts for allied troops in various parts of northern Egypt during World War II. In 1946 she made her British orchestral début at the Albert Hall, London, playing Grieg's Piano Concerto with the New London Orchestra under Alec Sherman. Following her American début at New York's Town Hall in 1950, she undertook many coast-to-coast tours of the USA. After the death of her first husband she married Alec Sherman in 1951.

Bachauer was at her most formidable in the 19th- and early 20th-century repertory, impressing with the strength and breadth of her keyboard command and essentially balanced musicianship. Her recordings of concertos by Beethoven, Brahms, Chopin and Grieg, as well as solo works by Debussy, Ravel and Stravinsky, have been re-issued on compact disc.

This is an amazing performance of the sonata.  Gina Bachauer was a well-known and respected concert pianist during the mid-20th century, but has become largely forgotten today, which is exceedingly unfortunate.  Much of her discography is out of print, and only a few LPs made it to digital transfer.  However, the level of her playing was very high and I would like to see all of them, this one in particular, re-issued.

She makes several appearances in the Mercury Living Presence I box, mostly concertos. Perhaps in the other two as well... don't have them so can't confirm that suspicion.

[San Antone]

She makes several appearances in the Mercury Living Presence I box, mostly concertos. Perhaps in the other two as well... don't have them so can't confirm that suspicion.

I wonder how available those are as individual discs?  I rated her performance of the sonata second only to Horowitz's among those recordings made prior to 1960 and hers came in at #11 of all recordings.  Of course these are just my own very subjective ratings, nevertheless, it speaks to the relative strength I placed on her playing.

[San Antone]

Well, so much for my discography - at least for the time being. 

In the process of cleaning up the portable drive that contained all the documents - I accidentally deleted the primary folder.  Nothing was in the Recycle bin, either, since after talking with a tech guy - deleting from a portable drive is a permanent deletion.  I have an older version - and will use that to reconstruct.  Actually, this will give me an opportunity to revisit the recordings and listening a second time, especially with the previous experience under my belt, will surely prove to render more meaningful results.

I will go at it more slowly, now that the push to publish is off the table.  And I am sure the reconstructed version will be superior to the one I lost.

[Karl Henning]

You've found the silver lining!

Sorry about that errant mouse-click; we've all been there . . . .

[San Antone]

You've found the silver lining!

Sorry about that errant mouse-click; we've all been there . . . .

Thanks, Karl.  I am pretty pissed at myself.  Lesson learned about the importance of backing up portable drives, especially.

[Pat B]

Thanks, Karl.  I am pretty pissed at myself.  Lesson learned about the importance of backing up portable drives, especially.

It's probably recoverable, even though your tech guy said it wasn't. If you want to consider that, stop using the drive immediately. Then read this (skip down to the "Try file recovery software" section).

OTOH, it sounds like you might be looking forward to the revisit.

[San Antone]

It's probably recoverable, even though your tech guy said it wasn't. If you want to consider that, stop using the drive immediately. Then read this (skip down to the "Try file recovery software" section).

OTOH, it sounds like you might be looking forward to the revisit.

Thanks for this information; I've already used the drive some but will try the free software option.  While I am not giving up on the project, it is probably an exaggeration to say I am "looking forward" to reconstructing the documents. 

Hey, it could be worse.

[San Antone]

Once I got over the forehead smack of deleting my files, and committed myself to a reconstruction, I decided to make this discography even better than the one I lost.  Originally I never intended to make it complete, choosing to concentrate only on recordings since 1970, but that soon gave way to a creeping sense of completeness - but one which I did not entirely achieve. 

This new reconstruction has already borne fruit: I have found 5 of the 7 Claudio Arrau recordings in various places and may purchase the other two; also I will include both Daniel Barenboim performances, the one from 1985 I already owned but his earlier one on DG  from 1979 is on YouTube.  Since I will be taking my time with this reconstruction, one way I will relieve the tedium and frustration will be to hunt down all the recordings and truly make this discography as complete as possible.

[Karl Henning]

Kudos for the making of lemonade!

[Cato]

Thanks for this information; I've already used the drive some but will try the free software option.  While I am not giving up on the project, it is probably an exaggeration to say I am "looking forward" to reconstructing the documents. 

Hey, it could be worse.

According to my mathematician/computer expert son, the information is there, unless you have hammered the drive or melted it: it simply is a matter of knowing how to retrieve it, for which then you need experts.   0:)

Gina Bachauer!!!  Yes, she was one of the giants in the good ol' days!

I found this:

https://www.youtube.com/v/gYWTI7fynjU

and this curiosity!  Not Liszt, but perhaps of interest:

https://www.youtube.com/v/rkpPHxlZI5Q

[San Antone]

According to my mathematician/computer expert son, the information is there, unless you have hammered the drive or melted it: it simply is a matter of knowing how to retrieve it, for which then you need experts.   0:)

Gina Bachauer!!!  Yes, she was one of the giants in the good ol' days!

I found this:

https://www.youtube.com/v/gYWTI7fynjU

and this curiosity!  Not Liszt, but perhaps of interest:

https://www.youtube.com/v/rkpPHxlZI5Q

Gina Bachauer is a great discovery I made through this process.  Simply fantastic.  Hers is just one of many recordings I've found, uploaded to YouTube from OOP vinyl, which are great recordings.  It is a real shame that many of these LPs either never made to disc or long deleted and hard to find, if that.

Regarding the thumb drive - I tried a file retrieval program which found the files, but which reported that they had been overwritten (my mistake was continuing to use the drive) and not recoverable.  I've made peace with the mistake, and am backing up every night, and now begining to look forward to re-creating my discography, but even better this time.

[kishnevi]

and this curiosity!  Not Liszt, but perhaps of interest:

https://www.youtube.com/v/rkpPHxlZI5Q

That is one of the recordings included in the Mercury LP I box.

[Holden]

A version from Annie Fischer has been added to NML recently. That might be interesting. Haven't heard it myself yet.

[San Antone]

A version from Annie Fischer has been added to NML recently. That might be interesting. Haven't heard it myself yet.

That's what I thought too, but I felt it wasn't as good as I expected.  Still worth a listen, I'd be interested to hear what you thought.

[Dancing Divertimentian]

Harmonies Poétiques et Religieuses.

Not the usual Liszt fair, at least in total. Scattered around various recital discs bits and pieces from this set do turn up - usually as filler. Funérailles of course is an island unto itself and easily justifies its popularity on disc. 

But the rest of the music is esoteric fair, to say the least. But it's Liszt. 'Nuff said.

What a thankless job it must be to perform this forbidding music. Like the third book of Années, it's not exactly material to inspire a second date from someone. Maybe a one-timer to the drive-in out of pity, but nothing beyond that.

What's lacking? Sex appeal. What's REALLY lacking? In all honesty, a sympathetic crowd.

But this is NOT crowd-pleasing music. Liszt has put the full brakes to his usual Elvis act, here, and fans anticipating a mad swing of his metaphoric hips will be left high and dry.

Liszt instead has something...easier...to communicate with this set. Easier in the sense that there's more than one way to cast a spell over a listener and if it can be done without blitzing the listener's senses with a million notes per minute then this is the way to do it. Shocking. But it works.

Liszt whips up his usual dazzle here but it's resolutely pitched at a low low speed with little to disrupt the overarching sense of melancholia dominating each and every bar. It's not easy listening, at least not at all times. And it simply won't work if the listener's attention is diverted elsewhere.

I can't think of any other music requiring more from the listener than what's on display here (even the moderns). The lone exception to this, as noted earlier, might be Funérailles.

Music like this won't make many friends. It doesn't give up its secrets without a little return work from the "crowd". But once acclimated the rewards are as plentiful as any in Liszt (or anywhere else).

Hat tip to Amoyel below for opening my eyes to the importance of this set as a whole. Fantastical Liszt needn't always come with a swing of the hips. 




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[San Antone]

B Minor Sonata Update

Step one is complete: reconstructing the discography, i.e the listing of recordings with images and some/many reviews attached.  Now I will begin the fun part, listening to (what has now become) the 298 recordings. 



Wish me well.

[Karl Henning]

Pace yourself, brother  0:)

[San Antone]

Pace yourself, brother  0:)

For sure.  I might complete it by the end of the year; but I am in no hurry. 

[Spineur]

Here is another great Liszt recording not yet mentioned.

Sorry I havent figured out how to add amazon link yet
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Minoru Nojima is a rare artist, even rarer in the west.  I find his reading of the B minor sonata stunning.  And I had heard many before.

This particular recording has been re-issued in hires and the sound is beautiful.  It has become my favorite recording of the B minor.
Mephisto valse is also great, although I prefer the orchestral version.