Liszt: Music's first rock star was also music's greatest fan

Who wrote more transcriptions or arrangements of others' work than Liszt?  His own creations sit atop 19th century romantic art and his last works presage modern atonality, but interestingly, much of what he did was rework the genius of others.

The famous Hungarian and Man About Europe wrote his own versions of works by more than 100 different composers.  Operas, songs, symphonies, organ works, etudes, and more.  For our money, that makes him music's greatest fan.

There are few more interesting personalities than his, by the way.  The wealthy touring virtuoso and number one pianist in Europe often gave benefit concerts wherever he was performing, always allowing an extra day for such in his busy schedule.  He taught numerous students without compensation, and aspirants from around the world sought his erudition in Weimar.  When he performed on stage, women fainted for him, and he enjoyed his many admirers, but he turned to the church in his last days.   His early and middle music was filled with notes and bombast, octaves and runs, but his last works were an almost otherworldly shunning of sound.  He wrote the Hungarian Rhapsodies but struggled himself with the language, and was more comfortable in French and German.

"Early in 1840, when he addressed the public at his first concert in Pest upon his return to his native Hungary after an absence of almost two decades, he began with the famous words Je suis Hongrois....

"Yes, he said it in French. For Liszt had not simply forgotten his Hungarian; he had never learned it. In 1873 he wrote, in a letter to a friend, Man darf mir wohl gestatten, dass ungeachtet meiner beklagenwerthen Unkentniss der ungarischen Sprache, ich von Geburt bis zum Grabe im Herzen und Sinne, Magyar verbleibe (It must surely be conceded to me that, regardless of my lamentable ignorance of the Hungarian language, I remain from birth to the grave, in heart and mind, a Magyar)."

One may conclude this thing of being Hungarian, was for Liszt, and many others, a state of mind.

More.

A man of contrast and paradox.

Give a listen to excerpts from ALL his works for piano here.  99 CDs on the Hyperion label.  A remarkable accomplishment of pianist Leslie Howard and the label that produced this box set.  To quote another famous romantic, "Hats off, gentlemen....."  (And ladies, of course......)