Many of the criticisms of Liszt stick, but you can't judge these pieces by the standards of a Bach fugue. If there's anything in classical music that comes close to the ecstasy of The Clash, or the beauty of Brian Eno, it is these works. The Etudes are also nearly impossible to play and as monomaniacal works they try to contain everything pianistic. A new version of the Etudes has appeared, by Miroslav Kultyshev. It starts slow but by Mazeppa (YouTube here) the listener takes notice. There are many bad or unlistenable versions of the Etudes but the recordings by Freddy Kempf (download here), Kemal Gekic,(YouTube here) and Vladimir Ovchinikov are of note. Nikolai Lugansky (YouTube only) is good with the dynamics. It is somehow appropriate that none of these talented pianists has met with major success more generally, as if other music is somehow "too little" for them. Or they sold their souls to the devil to play the Etudes and they are, underneath the surface, shattered empty men.
Tyler…the claim that “It is somehow appropriate that none of these talented pianists has met with major success more generally” isn’t really appropriate, especially with respect to Nikolai Lugansky, who is not even noted for his Liszt playing – he’s most known as a wonderful interpreter of Rachmaninoff and player of chamber music. In addition, Lazar Berman, Boris Berezovsky, Claudio Arrau, Janina Fialkowska, Gyorgy Cziffra and many others have put to disc great complete recordings of the transcendental etudes. There are dozens of others ‘comprehensive pianists’ with extensive repertoires who have given thrilling accounts of certain etudes…Richter (Feux Follets, Harmonies du Soir), Ashkenazi (Feux Follets), Busoni (Feux Follets), Petri (Mazeppa)…and btw, these works are by no means “almost impossible to play”; they’re difficult – especially Feux Follets…but not really near the difficulty of Godowsky, tougher Alkan, Bartok etudes etc.
I echo Jacob that Godowsky holds the championship belt in absurd difficulty. I also think that Liszt’s Mephisto Waltz No. 1 is his most profound work, and that in general Chopin’s etudes remain the gold standard in etudes. And I’ll even go so far as to suggest that Liszt’s greatest contribution to music was not his own work, but his role in exposing the then-obscure work of Franz Schubert.
The real pity about Lizst is that we will never be able to watch him play. I once read that during recitals that he would often have a young lady rise from the audience and “faint” at the power of his play just as he was finishing a dazzling and difficult piece and that he could catch her with one arm while finishing the piece with a single hand. The story is probably apocryphal, but much of his composition always leaves me thinking of profound showmanship.
@Tyler:
Arrau’s set is among the worst? Hmm…Interesting! Keep in mind Arrau studied under Krause (a pupil of Liszt), won the Liszt prize in 1919, and put to disc some of the most fabulous Liszt recordings in history (1928, Spanish Rhapsody, Hungarian rhapsodies, concerti etc. from the 50s)…in any event, I think you`re grossly underrating one of the greatest Lizst interpreters of all time. I agree that his Philips transcendental set, recorded when he was already in his 70s, has quite a weak Feux Follets…but I strongly urge you to re-listen to his technically jaw-dropping Wilde Jagd, his church-organ like octaves and amazing slow-section in Mazeppa, and his incomprably poetic renditions of Harmonies du Soir and Chasse Neige…(maybe only Louis Kenter engenders more light in Harmonies du Soir). PS…Berman actually recorded two complete sets of the Transcendental Etudes. The best one, in my view, is the 1958 Melodiya set, which I reckon has the most exciting accounts of nos 2, and 8 ever put to disc.
Berezovsky is fantastic, I think. There is a live recording of him playing the whole cycle in La Roque d’Anthéron (have a look here and here, I think the full concert is online) that is full of power and his technique is amazing. If you like, him you might also want to look for him playing Prokofiev piano concerto and Godowski (this is the stuff where you will probably not find anyone saying “common, it is not THAT difficult”).
Of course, if you want an entirely different kind of “difficult” this might be for you.
No mention of Kissin?
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=NtiQtzDqdaI
Good grief, Tyler, these etudes aren’t that hard. I played one when I was twelve (with the depth of a twelve-year-old, of course, but technically error-free). And there are plenty of Chinese and Korean children who, forced by their parents to practice 6+ hours a day, can whip them out provided their hands are just big enough.
As someone who’s played a great deal of Liszt in their day, his music reminds me the most of Queen. In general, not terribly deep, but a great deal of fun.
Comparison of Liszt to the Clash and Eno are pretty sad. Corny at best would be the right word. Sad?
Kissin’s Moscow performance of La Campanella, also by Liszt (and Paganini), is also pretty amazing.
Like the Transcendentals, La Campanella is rarely performed well.
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=QpnM1ahqzdw
I have read your blog fairly often, but was much taken aback by your rating of Liszt’s Transcendental Etudes(and the Clash and Eno) as superior to all other classical music with respect to “ecstasy” and “beauty”. I think I am not alone in finding a great deal of classical music superior to these Etudes as far as those two categories are in question. In fact, I think most people who like and know a little about classical music would hold some other pieces by Liszt himself superior to those etudes in all respects except technical difficulty. If, as it appears, you are so far off base on an important matter like classical music, how can you be trusted about less significant matters such as economics and politics?
Tyler:
“Of the sets you mention I like only the Berman and even that I think is out of date”
I think I know what you are trying to say, but this is a crude way of expressing your aesthetic preferences and assumes an historical progress to musicianship which is ridiculous to my way of thinking. Perhaps if Liszt had recorded his own version it would be out of date as well! Or perhaps the pieces themselves are out of date?
“ecstasy of The Clash”? I saw the Clash play, fantastic yes, maybe the concert I’ve best enjoyed, but I’m not sure ecstasy is a term I’d use.
“anything in classical music that comes close to … the beauty of Brian Eno”?
Good heavens! The whole corpus of classical music (with the exception of Liszt) lags behind Brian Eno? Bach, Mozart, Beethoven, Chopin, Brahms, Verdi, Stravinsky?
’tis a dismal science indeed.
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