![]() ![]() Daniel, their third child, was born in 1839 in Rome but died at the age of only 20. Their second child was Cosima, born in 1837, destined to become the wife of Richard Wagner. Within a year, she had left her husband and joined Liszt in Geneva where Blandine, the first of their three children, was born. The fact that she had a husband and three children was of no importance when it came to such a grand passion. In 1834 Liszt met the beautiful Comtesse Marie d’Agoult. His re-emergence on the concert platform was a major artistic event and the pianistic artillery he had acquired swept all rivals aside. To achieve this involved creating a new pianistic technique.įor the next two years, Liszt shut himself away to master his objectives, daily practising assiduously to the point of exhaustion. Paganini had dramatically extended the possibilities of the instrument with his astounding technical prowess and Liszt consciously set out to emulate on the piano what Paganini had achieved on the violin. But it was the electrifying effect of Paganini’s stage presence and the spectacular demands of his music that immediately fired Liszt’s imagination. From Berlioz he learnt about the possible sonorities of the orchestra – Liszt’s later orchestral works testify to that from Chopin he absorbed the poetry and refined, sensitive taste of the Pole’s piano style. Then in 1830 he met three musicians who changed everything: Chopin, Berlioz (then virtually unknown) and Paganini. Religion and philosophy for a time replaced music as the dominant force in Liszt’s life. Liszt, exhausted by constant touring, bowed out of the limelight for a few years, teaching, reading everything he could get his hands on and embarking on the first of his many passionate love affairs. Liszt’s father died suddenly of typhoid fever, enjoining his son to hand over his fortune to his mother in recognition of the person who had made it possible. By the age of 16 Liszt was famous throughout Europe and financially self-sufficient. The fashionable salons welcomed him both in the French capital and in London. ![]() A concert at the Opéra in March 1824 established him as one of the finest pianists ever heard. Still only 12 and a finished pianist, Liszt left Vienna for Paris. At one, attended by Beethoven and in which Liszt played an arrangement of a Beethoven piano trio from memory, the great master is said to have kissed his brow and exclaimed, ‘Devil of a fellow! – such a young rascal!’ Liszt also made his bow as a composer at this time, one of those asked to contribute a variation on a theme by Diabelli. His piano mentor there was the illustrious Carl Czerny, who refused to accept payment for the pleasure of teaching the Hungarian wunderkind. Prince Nicholas Esterházy was impressed enough to arrange for a group of Hungarian aristocrats to fund the musical education of the prodigy to the tune of 600 florins a year and Liszt, with his mother and ambitious father, moved to Vienna in 1821. Hungarian wunderkindīy nine Liszt could not only play the difficult B minor Concerto of Hummel in public but was able to extemporise on themes submitted by the audience. He was as arrogant and egocentric as he was also humble and generous he was a profoundly spiritual man yet delighted in the pleasures of the flesh – at least 26 major love affairs and several illegitimate children (Ernest Newman said, ‘He collected princesses and countesses as other men collect rare butterflies, or Japanese prints, or first editions’) attracted to the life of a recluse, he loved luxury and the adulation of the public he practised at the highest level of his art yet could demean himself with meretricious theatrics: all in all, a fascinating man. Yet he remains the most contradictory personality of all the great composers. ![]() Liszt's Totentanz: a guide to the best recordingsĬomposer, teacher, Abbé, Casanova, writer, sage, pioneer and champion of new music, philanthropist, philosopher and one of the greatest pianists in history, Liszt was the very embodiment of the Romantic spirit. He worked in every field of music except ballet and opera and to each field he contributed a significant development. Franz Liszt (born Octodied July 31, 1886) was the very embodiment of the Romantic spirit.
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