Composer Profile: Franz Liszt (1811-1886)
A mesmerizing pianist and composer who still entrances us today
Edited by Barry Lenson from Content Generated by the Claude AI App
You might say that the compositions of Franz Liszt take second place behind those of Brahms, Mendelssohn, Schumann, Tchaikovsky, Wagner (who was Liszt’s son-in-law), and the other greatest composers of the nineteenth century. But when you start to dismiss Liszt as a secondary composer, you encounter his enigmatic Faust Symphony or one of his vast works for organ and you think that you have underestimated him. The man and his music still exert a particular fascination for us today.
Who Was Franz Liszt?
Franz Liszt (1811-1886) stands as one of the most influential and charismatic figures in the history of classical music. Born in Raiding, Hungary (then part of the Austrian Empire), to a German father and Austrian mother, Liszt would become the archetypal Romantic composer-virtuoso, revolutionizing piano technique, orchestral composition, and the entire approach to musical performance.
Early Prodigy and Parisian Years
Liszt’s extraordinary musical gifts manifested early. His father, Adam Liszt, an amateur musician employed by the Esterházy family, recognized his son’s talent and arranged for piano lessons. By age nine, Franz was performing publicly, and his abilities so impressed local Hungarian nobles that they funded his musical education in Vienna. There, he studied with Carl Czerny, Beethoven’s former pupil, and Antonio Salieri.
In 1823, the family moved to Paris, where twelve-year-old Franz quickly became a sensation in the city’s salons. However, the Paris Conservatory rejected him due to his foreign birth, a slight that would influence his later advocacy for musical education reform. Despite this setback, Liszt thrived in Parisian musical society, performing for aristocrats and intellectuals alike.
The death of his father in 1827 left sixteen-year-old Franz as his family’s sole provider. He supported his mother through teaching and performing, but also experienced a period of spiritual crisis and contemplated entering the priesthood. This religious inclination would resurface throughout his life, ultimately shaping the compositions of his later years.
The Virtuoso Years
The 1830s marked Liszt’s transformation into the ultimate Romantic virtuoso. Inspired by violinist Niccolò Paganini’s transcendent performances, Liszt dedicated himself to achieving similar heights on the piano. He developed revolutionary techniques that expanded the instrument’s expressive possibilities, introducing innovations like the use of the entire keyboard range, complex hand crossings, and orchestral effects achieved on the piano.
During this period, Liszt became involved with Countess Marie d’Agoult, a married French aristocrat and writer. Their scandalous relationship produced three children, including Wagner’s future wife Cosima, and inspired some of Liszt’s most passionate compositions. The couple lived together openly, defying social conventions and embodying the Romantic ideal of the artist as rebel.
Liszt’s concert tours across Europe during the 1840s established the template for the modern piano recital. He was among the first to perform solo programs entirely from memory, often playing on stages lit dramatically with candles. His performances were theatrical events that drew hysterical responses from audiences, particularly women, in what Heinrich Heine dubbed “Lisztomania.”
Weimar and Creative Maturity
In 1848, Liszt accepted the position of Kapellmeister in Weimar, marking a shift from performer to composer and conductor. This period, lasting until 1861, proved extraordinarily productive. He composed most of his major orchestral works, including his two piano concertos, symphonic poems, and the Faust Symphony. His conducting championed contemporary composers, notably Richard Wagner.
At Weimar, Liszt lived with Princess Carolyne Sayn-Wittgenstein, a wealthy Polish-Russian aristocrat who encouraged his compositional ambitions. Their relationship lasted over a decade, though they never married due to complications with her divorce proceedings.
The Princess’s intellectual influence pushed Liszt toward more serious artistic pursuits and helped him develop his theories about program music, music that conveys a story, scene, or idea. Following his programmatic muse, Liszt essentially invented the symphonic poem, a single-movement orchestral form that tells a story or evokes images through music. Works like Les Préludes, Mazeppa, and Hamlet demonstrated how music could paint vivid pictures and express complex narratives without words, influencing both his contemporary Berlioz and later composers, including Richard Strauss.
Later Years and Legacy
After leaving Weimar, Liszt divided his time between Rome, Weimar, and Budapest, a period known as his “vie trifurquée” (threefold life). In Rome, he took minor holy orders in 1865, becoming Abbé Liszt, though he never became a priest. His late compositions, including the stark Via Crucis and experimental pieces like Nuages gris, pointed toward musical modernism with their harmonic innovations and spiritual introspection.
As a teacher, Liszt influenced countless pianists through his masterclasses, establishing pedagogical traditions still followed today. Unlike many teachers of his era, Liszt never charged fees, believing music education should be accessible to all talented students.
Liszt died in Bayreuth in 1886, having attended the Wagner Festival one final time. His death followed a brief illness, and he was mourned throughout Europe as both a musical giant and a generous mentor who had shaped the course of Romantic music.
My Personal Liszt Favorites
I first came under Liszt’s spell years ago when I was a conservatory student. I began singing his songs and listening to as many recordings of his works as I could find. So if you will indulge me, I would like to share this list of many of my top Liszt selections, all available for listening on Classical Archives.*
Piano Works
Liszt left behind a number of remarkable works for keyboard. Here are only a few recommendations for listening.
Transcendenal Etudes (“études d’exécution transcendante”) – These are real finger-benders. They’re called “transcendental” because Liszt meant them to showcase a way of playing the piano that transcended all earlier forms of piano technique. And they do. But when you live with them for a while, you sense that they have deeper meanings than you at first realized. We have a terrific Naxos performance for you on Classical Archives, played by Jenö Jandó.
Piano Sonata in B-minor – Okay, you just can’t make a list of Liszt piano works without including this immense, rambling, and confounding one-movement sonata. It’s a favorite among young pianists making their debut recitals, who just want to prove they can play it. When I was in music school, I once spent a few hours analyzing it and – would you believe? – it really is built in a classic sonata structure. We have another terrific Naxos performance for you on Classical Archives, again played by Jenö Jandó.
Années de pèlerinage (“Years of Pilgrimage”) – Liszt wrote three volumes of these unique piano pieces, which are a kind of musical travelogue of places he visited during his remarkable life. Some of these pieces seem to presage the impressionist works of Debussy. Here is a great Chandos recording on Classical Archives, featuring pianist Louis Lortie.
Songs
I have a particular affection for Liszt’s songs. Some are unique, really quite fantastic, and well worth exploring.
“Oh! Quand je dors” (“Oh, as I sleep”) – This remarkable setting of a text by Victor Hugo is lyrical, romantic, atmospheric, and gorgeous. The first stanza is:
Oh when I sleep, come near to my bed,
As Laura appeared to Petrarch,
And as you pass, your breath will touch me
And suddenly my lips will part!
Classical Archives invites you to hear this song in a performance by Konstantin Wolff (baritone) and Trung Sam (pianist) on the Harmonia Mundi label.
Tre Sonetti di Petrarca (“three sonnets by Petrarch”) – Liszt’s settings of three sonnets by Francesco Petrarca are as fine as any songs written in the nineteenth century. We are pleased to offer you a remarkable recording featuring the great tenor Alfredo Kraus and pianist Edelmiro Arnaltes.
“Die drei Zigeuner” (“The three gypsies“) – This highly unusual song depicts a chance meeting between its narrator and three gypsies, who teach him life lessons . . .
In three ways they showed me that,
When life turns dark,
To sleep it, smoke it, and fiddle it away,
. . . are three ways of disdaining it.
Note that the opening theme of this song was also used by Liszt in his Piano Concerto No. 1 (see below). We are pleased to share with you a historical recording on the Bluebell label, featuring tenor Nicolai Gedda and pianist Lars Roos.
Symphonic Poems
Liszt wrote a number of what he called “poems” for orchestra – all of them remarkable tone poems. You will want to explore them all in recordings on Classical Archives, but here are two of my favorites.
Les Préludes – This perennial audience favorite is based on the poem of the same name by Alphonse de Lamartine. This Naxos recording features the Polish National Radio Orchestra conducted by Michael Halász.
Mazeppa – My favorite among all of Liszt’s symphonic poems, this dramatic piece depicts Ivan Mazeppa, a Ukrainian nobleman, as he takes a wild ride on horseback. Our recording on the Archiphon label features the Vienna Opera Orchestra conducted by Hermann Scherchen.
Piano Concertos
Piano Concerto No. 1 – Liszt composed many works for piano and orchestra. Yet his first piano concerto represents everything that makes Liszt’s music so unusual – its virtuosic demands on the soloist, deeply romantic mood, and brooding atmosphere. This Russian Compact Disc recording features the great Russian pianist Sviatoslav Richter with the London Symphony conducted by Kyrill Kondrashin.
* Please note that to listen to the recordings cited in this newsletter, you must be a member of Classical Archives. If you are not yet a member, we invite you to join now. Free 14-day trial memberships are now available.
