The Piano Sonatas of Franz Schubert (1797-1828): Integral Edition Series

Schubert at the Piano, by Gustav Klimt

Sometimes we all just need somewhere to go, somewhere to take our minds away from the common grind of everyday concerns (or perhaps in my case to recover from another Wagner encounter). One place we have long advocated is to have recourse to these often quite surprising compositions by one of the greatest among “classical” music composers of what today some prefer to call the “First Vienna School” as a way to group together Haydn, Mozart, Beethoven, Schubert and others; the “classical” composers.

Any of Franz Schubert's piano sonatas are longer than any Mozart or Haydn would have considered manageable, and even most Beethoven sonatas are not nearly as long. If as a pianist, you decide to take the plunge into any of them, be prepared for some moderate to difficult work, but a uniquely rewarding experience of pianism for your efforts.

Schubert's sonatas were not nearly as well known as Beethoven's or Mozart's during their lifetimes. Beethoven's all have opus numbers and dates of first publication, which of course meant that they were influential on Schubert who was 27 years younger than Beethoven, in whose shadow Schubert's music grew in gratitude and tribute. Schubert's sonatas should be better known, but we are confronting a few interesting problems regarding them that do not afflict the works of the previous classical masters.

We'll begin with those sonatas published during Schubert's lifetime (and some not) following the order in the first "integral" edition of Schubert's sonatas by Breitkopf and Härtel, published in 1888, available in the USA in a reprint from Dover. You'll notice as we go along that some of the links referenced refer to sonatas with different numbering systems. Nevertheless the order in which they are presented here is the oldest standard numbering system used for them and we should probably stick to it from now on.

What this will mean is that after this “integral” set, and there are fifteen of these sonatas, other sonatas will turn up which may have been written earlier than the first one in this series. That should not matter, the first Schubert sonata would hereafter be the E Major written around his 18^th birthday in 1815. At the time of its writing, Beethoven, always a model for Schubert, was in his forties, musically very active in that crucial year which brought an end to Napoleon's military ambitions.

Some links, where they contain the performance of an entire sonata, are under the title of the sonata. At other times, links are found under the various headings for each movement. The second group of posthumously published sonatas will follow in a future article.

Enjoy!

1815: “Late Winter” and “Late Summer” from the composer's youth

Sonata #1 in E Major (February, 1815) D. 157 

 

Schubert was just 18 years old when he wrote this, and since others would follow this same year we might dub this the “Late Winter” sonata to keep track of it, indeed there are references to slips and slides in the first movement. It's certainly a demanding first sonata, more intricate and nuanced than Mozart's, Haydn's or Beethoven's early sonatas, but it derives from all of their stylistic contributions to the form, and of course in the city where they all lived and knew so well; Vienna, the late 18^th and early 19^th century capital of the multi-cultural Hapsburg Austrian Empire, not really a melting pot society, hence it was gradually disintegrating under the weight of war debt and the effects of war. Under the circumstances, this work is an extraordinary gem. But then again, they all are.

1. Allegro ma non troppo

2. Andante

3. MENUETTO, Allegro vivace - Trio

Arcadi Volodos, piano (Rec: live in Amsterdam, 8/18/2001)

Sonata #2 in C Major (September, 1815) D. 279
 

This is a companion sonata to the previous one, and composed later his 18^th year; hence our calling this one the “Late Summer” sonata. In this performance, the 4^th movement is a presumption on Noël Lee's part. It is not printed in the standard Breitkopf and Härtel edition (which is available in the USA published by Dover) however it does appear in the Henle Verlag URTEXT edition of Schubert's sonatas, which does not follow the order of the “integral” edition; these sonatas open the third volume of their three volume set and after the Sonata D. 279, they print the Allegretto -fragment D. 346. However, and it does say this on his recording, this is an unfinished fragment which Noël Lee completed. You can get a copy of it in the Henle edition but completed by Paul Badura-Skoda so in particular the ending will be different. This Allegretto was written supposedly sometime in 1816 when Schubert would have been 19 years old.

1. Allegro moderato

2. Andante
3. MENUETTO, Allegro vivace - Trio
4. [Allegretto] Allegretto (fragment D. 346 C Major) (completed by Noël Lee)

Noël Lee, piano (Rec: rare Vinyl LP - stereophonique - made in France, recorded 1970. Piano is a Steinway.

1817: Mozart and Beethoven revisited

Sonata #3 in A Flat Major (May, 1817) D. 557

 

This sonata, though perhaps less demanding than the previous two, is Schubert's extension of some essentially Mozart inspired ideas; pretty phrases rather than melodies, punctuated by episodic figures. In the year it was written this would be largely looking back to composers who inspired him the most. He is also extending the range of these same classical devices, showing them in different lights than these composers could possibly have imagined.

One reason Schubert is important to our greater understanding of this “classical” music, is his contribution to the emotional range available through very subtle shading of tone leading, suspensions, tension, silence, all kinds of things that are usually extremely subtle and often profound in ways unachieved by the previous classical masters. Mostly one is surprised by this unique harmonizing element that is particularly Schubert's voice. Indeed, it sometimes comes as a shock to recognize that someone as well known as Franz Schubert is so deservedly well regarded for their contributions to music.

1. Allegro moderato

2. Andante

3. Allegro

Wilhelm Kempff (1895-1991) , piano.  In this set of Schubert sonatas, this one is listed as Sonata #5.

Sonata #4 in e minor (June 1817) D. 566 & D. 506

Much of the basic technique for this sonata stems from Beethoven, yet Schubert has here, and with all of these sonatas, clearly found his own voice, singing much of the time. There are problems getting the music together for this sonata. Only its first movement appears in the integral (Dover) edition. The “complete” sonata is available in the Henle Verlag URTEXT edition, Band III as Sonata #5.

This sonata has four movements, and they are in the order listed, with the last part of D. 506 serving as a rondo finale. The full D. 506 includes a preparatory Adagio. I could find no performances of this part of this sonata on line (why am I surprised?) .Perhaps I'll get the Adagio and at least read through the complete D. 506. In any case it was composed along with this sonata and good copies are around to prove it. The Op. 145 pieces were published posthumously.

The rest of it was played at a live concert by Sviatoslav Richter in 1964. I've linked the movements as they belong in sequence rather than as Richter plays them; he plays 3. Scherzo then concludes with 2. Allegretto.

1. Moderato 
2. Allegretto 
3. SCHERZO, Allegro vivace - Trio

4. RONDO, Allegretto (Op. 145 #2 : D. 506 B)

SviatoslavRichter (1915-1997), piano. He was 49 at the time of this performance.

Sonata #5 in B Major (August, 1817) Op. 147 D. 575

There are some mysteries in this sonata, almost anticipations of Mendelssohn and Schumann, Schubert looking on into the future, singing at least four distinct themes in the first movement's exposition, extending the form as far as he can. He's just 20 and has already written a lot in this same vein, but the shading in this sonata is different. The integral edition (Dover) includes the complete score; all 4 movements. Henle Verlag has it in Band I listed as Sonata #3. The late great American pianist, Eunice Norton in her 1992 performance certainly captures much of this music's poetic charm in this beautiful performance.

1. Allegro ma non troppo

2. Andante

3. SCHERZO, Allegretto - Trio 
4. Allegro giusto
 
EuniceNorton (1908-2005), pianist. She was 84 when she played this, a remarkable achievement and legacy!

[13 Dec, 13: Christian Zacharias' performance here.] 

Sonata #6 in a minor (1817) Op. 164 D. 537

This is one of the more recognizable early Schubert sonatas. Yes, it derives plenty of inspiration from Beethoven, but also oddly predicts some of the directions pianism would be going, things Grieg might be doing fifty years later. The second movement will have you thinking of perhaps the same theme Schubert uses to make a grand finale for one of his later sonatas (#14 in this series). Yes, Schubert apparently really liked this little song and used it in two of his piano sonatas.

Arturo Benedetti Michelangeli played this as part of his 7 April 1991 concert in Lugano, Switzerland. The piano was certainly a Steinway D. The entire thing appears as close to how he plays it in the integral edition. Henle presents this one as Sonata #1 at the beginning of Band I.

1. Allegro ma non troppo
2. Allegretto quasi Andantino  
3. Allegro vivace

Arturo Benedetti Michelangeli (1920–1995), pianist. 72 years old when he played this heroic performance.

Sonata #7 in E Flat Major (1817) Op. 122 D. 568
 




Among Schubert's most popular and recognizable sonatas, the opening phrase reminds oddly of the beginning of the commercial Christmas song, It Came Upon a Midnight Clear. Many great pianists have played it. Wilhelm Kempff played this one and in his set he has it as the 7^th sonata. He repeats back to the development of the first movement, which does not appear in the score in either the integral edition (Dover) or the Henle URTEXT edition, but it really doesn't matter. Henle Verlag has this one in Band I as Sonata #2. There is a transcription of this same sonata minus the 3^rd movement transcribed to D Flat Major. It's theorized that Schubert wrote the 3ed movement at some later date.

1. Allegro moderato 
2. Andante molto
3. MENUETTO, allegretto - Trio 
4. Allegro moderato
 
1823-1825: A Young Man's Recognition of Mortality

Sonata #8 in a minor (September, 1823) Op. 143 D. 784
 

This justly famous sonata was written after one of Schubert's near misses with death the previous year. He was only 26 but had never been very fit or in good health. A fate theme of a kind appears in the first movement and is met with sublime resignation. In this live recording of one of his 1960's Carnegie Hall performances, Sviatoslav Richter chooses a tempo some of us would consider way too slow for the Andante, but by choosing this slower tempo, the piano has more time to sing and this performance is a stand-out because this slower tempo allows for each voice in Schubert's embellished almost orchestral writing to find its natural place in the musical tapestry. The finale has the distinction of forming a setting for one of Schubert's most tender songs, where besides its uses in the main sonata allegro form, it is repeated within what would be an extended coda similar to the finale of a piano concerto.

To me, this sonata is Schubert's answer to his impending mortality, for after this his rate of composition, as if he hasn't been writing non-stop for years, if anything accelerates, as if he knows he hasn't long and will nonetheless function as music's willing amanuensis, faithfully taking down, much as Mozart did, and leaving nothing out, all the great music he would write until he was unable to continue. Whatever hardships Schubert suffered in his brief life, some things become apparent after hearing this sonata; Schubert met his fate with resigned faith and whether he knew love in the grandest sense or not, that embedded song in the last movement certainly indicates that he knew love from someone, even if it had only been from his mother.

1. Allegro giusto
[A. Exposition] 
[B. Development, Recapitulation]

2. Andante 
3. Allegro vivace

Sonata #9 in a minor (1825) Op. 42 D. 845

 



Companions in a way, the two a minor sonatas. Wilhelm Kempff's performance is certainly a good standard one, particularly regarding dynamics and balance, rather peppy in fact in the first movement. One wouldn't really like to push the envelopes too far in any of these pieces or one gets strange results. Careful observance of dynamic markings helps greatly in the turning of phrases, in the case of Schubert often starting in one hand and ending in another. There is often a tremendous tendency to overplay Schubert when the music itself certainly contains enough weight in and of itself and should never be overplayed. It is much better to get oneself to sing through the playing of all of this music, as indeed did the young composer himself when he was in the process of writing it all down. The theme and variations second movement is one of those quintessential Schubert delights.

1. Moderato  
2. Andante pocomoto
3. SCHERZO, Allegro vivace - Trio, Un poco più lento 
4. RONDO: Allegro vivace [There are some problems with the beginning of this recording that soon clear up]

Wilhelm Kempff, piano. (In this set of Schubert sonatas, this one is listed as Sonata #16)

Sonata #10 in A Major (Summer, 1819) Op. 120 D. 664

 



A sheer delight! This popular Schubert sonata is here played by the Austrian pianist Ingrid Haebler with some rare insights. Although it comes here in order of publication, this sonata is out of sequence and precedes the last two.  It is warm and sunny in comparison to many of the moods of the last two.

1. Allegro moderato 
2. Andante
3. Allegro

Ingred Haebler (1929- ) This recording was made in 1969 when she was 49. It is also listed as Sonata #13. 

[13 Dec, 13: Christian Zacharias' performance here.]

The Last Five: 1825-1828

Sonata #11 “Gasteiner” in D Major (August, 1825 at Bad Gastein) Op. 53 D. 850

With a burst of exuberance, this sonata begins with one of the most idiomatically complex and manic demonstrations yet of Schubert's art at the age of 28 or ten years since the first sonata in this series. I don't expect too many people will want to rush out there and try to learn this piece because it is very difficult. To hear it to best advantage, you need someone with the power and depth of a Sviatoslav Richter. The second movement takes you into some very unexpected places including rhythmic elements which must be carefully observed. The theme that is embroidered this time is almost anthem like in its warm solemnity. Richter's read is quite moving. The final two movements are almost exhausting in their whimsical character. You've never heard a classical piano sonata quite like this one. Perhaps more than any of his previous sonatas, this one establishes Schubert's often eccentric style.

1. Allegro vivace
2. Con moto
3. SCHERZO, Allegro vivace - Trio
4. RONDO: Allegro moderato

Sviatoslav Richter (1915-1997), piano. Referenced as Sonata #17. This recording probably dates from 1956 when he was in his early forties.

[12 Dec, 13: Christian Zacharias' performance here.] 
[1 June, 14: Sergey Koudriakov's performance:
1. Allegro vivace
2. Con Moto [1] ... [2] 
3. SCHERZO 
4. RONDO]

Sonata #12 in G Major (October, 1826) Op. 78 D. 894







Serene, perhaps in the way the last sonata had been tumultuous, let's hear the way Claudio Arrau played it; subtlety itself. The slower tempos allow the piano more time to sing and that should be the abiding emphasis here. Schubert, ever the singer of songs, is at his best here. Never overplay any of this as it will ruin the beautiful flow of mood throughout.

1. Molto moderato e cantabile
2. Andante
3. MENUETTO, Allegro moderato - Trio
4. Allegretto

Claudio Arrau (1903-1991), piano. This is listed as Sonata #18 in his last session recording. 

[13 Dec, 13: Christian Zacharias' performance here.]
[15 Dec, 13: Alfred Brendel's performance here.]
[26 Dec, 13: Radu Lupu's performance here.]

Sonata #13 in c minor (September, 1828) D. 958
 




This sonata written just two months before his death might just as well be linked to Beethoven's Op. 13 “Pathetique” sonata in the same key, though Schubert rarely gets himself as worked up and there's plenty of contrapuntal writing pitting his endless song against tougher episodic elements, the repetition of chords varying tonal colouring being ever present. But Schubert's subtleties in every detail mark a clear departure from his mentor's style. This sonata concludes with an impressive, no stunning tarantella, as only Schubert would have rendered it, with a deep pause at the heart of it and devilish piano trickery throughout. Murray Perahia is absolute master of this music, his performance is brilliant throughout and his interpretations definitely worth emulating.

1. Allegro  
2. Adagio
3. MENUETTO, Allegro - Trio  
4. Allegro [Tarantella!]
 
MurrayPerahia (1947- ), piano. This featured performance was recorded 'live' at the Concertgebouw in Amsterdam, 22 June 2003 (56 years old). 

[13 Dec, 13: Christian Zacharias' performance here.] 
[15 Dec, 13: Alfred Brendel's performance here.]
[17 Dec, 13: Wilhelm Kempff's performance here.]

Sonata #14 in A Major (September, 1828) D. 959

Form has been revolutionized with this sonata and composers (even modern ones) please take note: In the first movement, Schubert has embedded a development section inside the exposition (and in the recapitulation too)! The development section for the whole first movement is a rhapsody allowing him to sing his heart out! I like Maurizio Pollini's performance of this sonata, especially of the Andantino, which contains Schubert's most impassioned (and on some level even angry) outburst, surrounded by a bitter sweet lullaby, a lullaby for the dying perhaps? The finale is an immense sonata allegro using the same song that was used in the 2^nd movement of Sonata #6 in this series, as its primary and recurring theme. Schubert stretches the form in this movement; there is a lot of rhapsodising, developments, unexpected continuations and you want it that way, a heart rending never ending melody.

1. Allegro
2. Andantino
3. SCHERZO, Allegro vivace - Trio, Un poco più lento
4. RONDO, Allegretto

Maurizio Pollini (1942- ), piano. Pollini was 41 when this performance was recorded in December, 1983 at the Musikverein, Großer Saal, in Vienna. 

[12 Dec, 13: Christian Zacharias' performance here.]

Sonata#15 in B Flat Major (September, 1828) Op. Post. D. 960

 



This piano sonata, along with the previous two, was written barely two months before Schubert died. The English pianist Clifford Curzon delivers a slightly faster pulsed version for the first movement than is customary and I like the improvement; the long phrased themes float over the chords. The second movement is what? Is it his own dirge? Does he know yet, certainly he must, that he is dying? Where is the hopeful and robust theme he places in the middle of this movement leading him? He changes a key and it almost sounds more hopeful, but that is not very realistic; a bitter sweet sad compromise is reached at the end. The two concluding movements have always struck me as incredibly light compared with the first two movements, though clever, suave and wonderfully conceived.

1. Molto moderato

2. Andante sostenuto  
3. SCHERZO, Allegro vivace con delicatezza - Trio
4. Allegro ma nontroppo

Clifford Curzon (1907-1982), piano. This performance was recorded on 30 June 1968. He was 61 years old.

[13 Dec, 13: Lazar Berman's performance here.]

Thank-you for taking the time to explore the pianistic universe within the Schubert piano sonatas with me. He wrote more than this standard set and we shall review them in a future post.


Also see: Schubert's Unfinished Piano Sonatas

FINIS

Music of the Great Composers – Richard Wagner (1813-1883)

Basic biographical detail is here.

Wagner's own literary works are to be found here.

“There is no doubt that there have been other composers who were no less anti-Semitic [… which term applies to those who hold prejudices against Jewish people. The term is not used with reference to peoples of Arab or Ethiopian descent, who are also considered Semitic peoples.]. While it cannot be maintained that Wagner was directly responsible for German national socialism [ah, but maybe it can!], there is no doubt that he was a powerful symbol in the Nazi era, and his music held a singular importance in the Nazi psyche. Thus, for Jewish survivors of the Nazi horrors, Wagner's music represents a vivid reminder of that regime. The argument that music must be separated from politics is not cogent in general, and certainly not in this case. If anybody introduced politics into music, it was Richard Wagner himself.” Lili Eylon – American-Israeli Co-operative Enterprise

“Wagner's music should not be played publicly. The function of music, after all, is to soothe, to make the listener feel good, to stimulate or pacify his or her soul [oh? … or is it?]. Whoever wants to hear Wagner's music can listen to it in private." Nechama Rosler, a violinist with the Jerusalem Symphony Orchestra.

If you perhaps think so too, well at least this blog gives you the opportunity to decide for yourself (better use headphones just in case), or you can ignore this post entirely and all that is Wagnerian as it is actually censored material in some places and among some people. That is of course up to you.

Look into this man as I did, more than anyone so far in this series, as neither his music or personality have ever been much to my liking or of much interest to me.  He wrote little for the piano.. Who Wagner was, where he came from, what he accomplished, at what great cost to everyone who was lured into helping him, I assure you that anti-Semitism was the least of his problems. But ignore his musical contributions to your great loss.

We do not know how such things happen, how such people acquire what talents they may, that they aspire to what others would deem them not entitled to, for Wagner may not have been the first, but he was certainly the most foremost among artists who demanded not just a living, but to live well and richly at the expense of others. Be careful how you point your fingers at ones such as Richard Wagner, because perhaps as he knew things to be himself in his day (make no mistake, his was a deep and clear though disturbed intelligence), he demanded a living from others as not just an artist, but as a national leader, indeed an actual political revolutionary.  If such a demand was so repulsive, then how is it that now in this 21^st century we allow such as produce and create NOTHING to demand from the rest of us that they live well at our expense? Be very careful how you judge Richard Wagner, for there are these days among us those with similar demands and these persons are every bit as odious and disgusting as Wagner ever was!

Richard Burton as Richard Wagner 

There was a famous dramatisation about Wagner starring Richard Burton. It dates from 1983. It's significant for its casting, cinematography and relative faithfulness to facts. If you imagine that Richard Wagner was any less odious and repulsive than Burton's representation, think again. He came from the streets, had nothing but his passion for something that was actually quite dark combined with towering ambition. Music was not Richard Wagner's first love but used as merely an adjunct to his literary work, for he was a writer as well as a composer; he was a true romantic!

Part 1

Part 2

Part 3 

Could Wagner write a Sonata?

This is a piano sonata he refers to as one he arranged for two people to play, he says he doesn't know when he found time to write, let alone finish, many early compositions. It would seem that he could and did. His preferred model was Beethoven, but you'll hear Schubert in places too. He's really too young to have found his voice, but he's well on his way, except that he would soon realize that his musical direction had nothing in common with the “classical music” he knew of at the time, nor its forms. He was always merely a functional pianist, never taking up or becoming particularly proficient on any instrument. but couldn't have been much older than 17 when he wrote this. Let's hear Nina Kavtaradze play it for us:

Piano Sonata in B flat, Op. 1, WWV21

I.Allegro con brio  
II. Larghetto

III.Menuetto

IV.Allegro vivace

Did Wagner write Beethoven's Tenth?

We may have this really quite excellent performance to make the point that much as this is a youthful composition, and it is, it is certainly without question built solidly out of symphonic elements that would otherwise be unmistakably Beethoven's; Wagner is able to achieve at 19 all the proof one needs to establish oneself as not just a composer, but one who comprehended to a degree unattained by others at the time, the architectural possibilities suggested by Beethoven's 7^th,, which Wagner heard for the first time at the most three years before writing this. Say what you like, because after all Wagner is unpardonable; say the work is stolen Beethoven, say that it's derivative, anything you like, the fact remains that within 3 years of hearing Beethoven's 7^th, Wagner changes course enough to figure out how to write down a fully scored symphony, the manuscript for which he lugs around with him during his early 20's as he tries, and succeeds, in getting work, as a conductor! How's that for taking action and achieving something?

Symphony in C Major (1832)

I.Movement "Sostenuto e maestoso, Allegro con brio

II.Andante ma non troppo, un poco maestoso

III.Allegro assai

IV.Allegro molto evivace.

Rundfunk-Sinfonie-Orchester Berlin

Heinz Rögner, conductor

What Wagner wrote besides operas, er music-dramas.

Among many weird and neglected (perhaps for good reason) compositions of Wagner's are overtures. An overture is frequently though not always thought of as that orchestral piece which precedes an opera. Here's one he composed after his marriage to Minna in 1836, it's theme, Rule Britannia! Here we have this work played by the Hong Kong Philharmonic Orchestra, Varujan Kojian, conductor

RuleBritannia Overture (1836)

Wagner's Music-dramas.

Wagner's contributions, particularly to orchestration, are well known. In fact it is a fair statement to suggest that, like it or not, he was the most influential composer of the entire 19^th century. One can listen to hours of Wagner and hear what others who followed him will be writing years later. If you bother with him at all, you could do no better than with Tristan und Isolde. Here it is (some of it) performed by the Bayerisches Staatsorchester under the direction of Zubin Mehta.

Tristan und Isolde Act I Prelude (Vorspiel)

Act III

What Wagner left behind.

Richard and Cosima had a son they named Siegfried after the hero of one of his operas. This Saigfried Wagner later became a compose and conductor like his father and grandfather, Franz Liszt. There were always rumours that Richard Wagner had had some homosexual experiences. There were more than rumours that Siegfried had. One wonders for it seems purely family reasons, Siegfried was finally compelled to marry an English girl 28 years younger than he, who bore him (and his family) four children! Here is Siegfried's symphony played in its original version by the Staatsphilharmonie Rheinland-Pfalz, Werner Andreas Albert, conductor.

Symphony in C Major (1925-1927)

I.Movement "Mässig"

II.Movement "Sehr langsam"
III.Movement "Lebhaft (Allegro)"

IV.Movement "Bewegt (Mosso)" 

FINIS

Ninth Interview – Many Subjects

Updates on The Linton Bequest and E. C. Riegel Blog

Embarking on a ninth interview, aren't you just a bit superstitious?  Laughs

No, not at all. We've been through an exceptionally strange couple of months. For some of it, I was under the weather.
What weather?

I know.  Laughs

Well the interest in your novel, The Linton Bequest, seems pretty slim.

Yes, maybe they know they wouldn't have the time for it, wouldn't enjoy it or more likely they just aren't readers.  Many people aren't readers these days.  They have good reasons.  They don't have the time, they are too busy, or they busy themselves with something else.  Some people I know wont, as they would say, waste their time reading anything but non-fiction.

No doubt you remind them there's a lot of fiction to be found there too.

Sometimes, if they can take it as a joke, but many these days are in no mood for jokes.

Will you be continuing with the instalments then?

Yes, though they may get spread out a little. I know I am overdue and will have another one up soon.

And the E. C. Riegel blog has also received scant attention.

I expected that each of these ventures would take a fairly long time to catch on as they are, let's face it, both quite esoteric.

Will you be continuing the Riegel blog then?

Well right now, I am in the process of trying to make contacts with others more conversant in these subjects than I, who do not know me as yet, and I expect that after private discussions with them, I will decide whether the project will go forward or be discontinued.

OK.

A haven of great kindness: Faust Harrison in White Plains, New York (their website)

The back showroom / concert space at Faust Harrison, White Plains, NY
In the foreground a beautiful restored Queen Anne Steinway M from the 1920's.

Your visit was a few weeks back.

Yes, I had the opportunity of transportation, so I decided to pay a visit. It began with Irving Faust, looking splendidly healthy, showing me around their new facility. It was all very well organized with work everywhere running smoothly and at every juncture Irving unfailingly praised his employees.

Wow, you don't hear much of that these days.

You certainly don't see much of it these days either. It was everywhere here, it pervaded the place. One felt as if one was for the time being among the blessed almost; a place that was built to enshrine a sense of quiet peace and calm, happiness and good vibrations.

You said that stepping inside was like entering a sanctuary of a kind.

You could say it that way. It was like entering a hallowed place for music and musicians and pianos, some of them the finest one could ever hope to find anywhere.

So how did it start, which pianos were you interested in?

Well it's also which pianos Irving or indeed the entire staff might be interested in that I could share with the rest of you out there.

New Yamaha and Bechstein grand pianos

The first two were one of the latest hand crafted pianos from Yamaha and a piano by Bechstein said to be built to compete.

Which did you like better?

The Bechstein won by a hair, but the Yamaha was unlike any Yamaha I have ever played before. It did not feel or sound like any Yamaha either. It sounded and felt closest to a good Grotrian or Steingraeber, a more European sound and feel. I felt the colour possibilities of this instrument from Yamaha were really amazing. I don't play anything by Liszt but I'd certainly like to hear some Liszt played on this remarkable new piano.

And the Bechstein?

It had, shall we say, a slightly more polite, less colourful pallet, but was … just overall slightly easier for me to play.

Now you also browsed their showrooms and what else did you find?

They have any number of very nice pianos from a half dozen well known brands, most in very good preparation by the way. They had a huge Bechstein upright, the model Debussy used most often to compose on in his studio, sitting next to it was a large Yamaha upright. It was a wonderful instrument too, I played Somewhere Over the Rainbow on it to the most applause from the staff. But with the words and ideas Sara Faust imparted concerning practice pianos fresh in my mind (she has certainly influenced how I look at any piano right now), I found many in their back showroom. 

Vintage era Steinway O or A

 One pictured here is a beautiful O (or perhaps an A) from before 1910, refurbished of course. I had a great conversation with Chris Pfund, a manager there, and expressed myself of a few opinions worth repeating here.

All right, such as?

For example that Bach played on a piano is usually better than on a harpsichord, with Foss Plays Bach (Lukas Foss) as an example.

That's a nice tip.

JeffreyBiegel's Bach performances, as well as Andrew Violette's Bach, prove this more to be so all the time.

You also talked to him a little about what you were doing learning some piano pieces?

Yes, the Schumann Fantasie Op. 17 in particular. It's coming along. I knew it would take a while for me to learn it the way I like to know a piece, because many things Schumann asks the pianist to do are very subtle. When Maestro Agustin Anievas inspired me to take up this piece, he said it took him 9 months to learn, but that it would take him 90 years to work out the interpretation. That's saying much about any really great piece of piano music, each time one comes to it one has new impressions, new ideas of how best to play it, etc. All of these matters on every conceivable piece of well loved piano music influence how each pianist approaches a piano.

Do you intend on returning to similar subjects in a future interview on pianism?

Yes I do, I am reviewing material to that end right now and maybe in a few months, I'll post something.

Very good. You also told Chris you liked your pianos black.

Yes.  I mentioned the “master class” Sara had inadvertently conducted on that day of my visit to their Manhattan showroom last year and the lasting impression it made on me for pianists to seek out good practice pianos rather than being attracted so easily to what she would term performance pianos. Yes, I told Chris that I like my pianos black. By Sara Faust's criteria, they had a few nice rebuilt or refurbished Steinways in the interior showroom that impressed me more than either of the new latest greatest I'd just played for all the reasons Sara indicated that day, the need to learn how to express yourself on a piano built to require that extra level of concentrated force from a pianist. It was as usual my misfortune (among many) to find most of these pianos were in wood finishes rather than in what is usually called satin ebony; black. How distracting wood grains can sometimes be to me. I told Chris I'd most likely be interested in a nice rebuilt ebony M or O (possibly an L) from maybe 1910 or earlier, to say 1925, made in New York, I do not always share the Hamburg Steinway prejudice.

And about Chinese pianos?

Yes, we spoke about those, Hailun pianos in particular, how I thought it would be good to see Asian lettering proudly displayed on piano fall-boards of pianos from Asian makers, etc.

You also mentioned the need for piano dealers to actively post something about the hypothetical financing with their pianos?

Well, while there are some, perhaps many, who do not need to concern themselves with these matters; they just go into a piano store the same as they might an auto dealership with a wad of cash and make a deal, there are many more who really will need these facts and figures at least somewhere present so that they can understand the relative value of a piano compared with some other typical large capital good, usually a car or truck or some other large machine. Pianos, after all, are large machines.

While you were there, they were doing some interesting restoration on a big antique Steinway concert grand?

Yes, this was another of those wonderful grand pianos from the 1870's, possibly a C or maybe a D, completely and thoroughly rebuilt by Faust Harrison.  This time Irving and Sara have allowed a talented piano technician to improve the action. I'm highly supportive of such activities. There's no reason to slavishly adhere to exact refurbishment if real improvements can be made. As the technician said, it is her intention to make this piano easier to play.

And again the mood of the entire place?

Oh, it was as I've said, a place of great peace, harmony, happiness and above all kindness, which radiates here from the top on down. I highly recommend Faust Harrison to all interested pianists and their families everywhere. Many have come from very far away to do business with them for good reason.

The Music of the Great Composers Series 

Some of us were curious why you started this series?

Some months back, it occurred to me that probably very few people really knew the music by composer the way I do, and really it seemed to me high time to review their contributions and discuss some things about who they really were and the times in which they lived, to give especially younger people, an understanding of what it really meant to make music the way we usually think of it on this blog; the so called “classical” music.

You can find adequate bios if you need them and music too as all your links are on line and elsewhere, so what's the difference?

This series will be on this blog as long as it is up and as I said I'm trying to put out there a basic historical review, from modern perspectives, of the lives and contributions of the great composers.

You haven't included some that at least a few people consider great.

I understand, and I very well might come back with a second tier as it were of neglected composers later after traversing the standard highway of the first tier composers.

Just curious who the last of the greatest composers in your list might be?

I don't know yet myself, possibly Igor Stravinsky. If there's anyone who was born after him that's as important, please let me know.

OK, good.  Which composer comes next?

Probably Richard Wagner.

Are you adding others to the standard list?

Of great composers? If there is such a list, certainly Saint Saens, Bruckner and Mahler belong on it, Puccini too. These each made outstanding individual contributions, so they will each be included. Others such as Bax, Busoni or Stenhammar would be on the second tier.

I've already noticed the degree to which music has been influenced by other art forms, particularly literature.

… and later motion pictures. It's difficult for many people these days to hear orchestral classical music without immediately thinking about the movies, cartoons or TV. We could in fact say that the music for movies preceded the movies themselves. In the case of Wagner, coming up next, we have someone who had enough vision to try and create a mass market for his unique art form, the music-drama, not opera as it had ever been before. Many of his his staging ideas anticipated film too. An outdoor festival playhouse as a venue for these total-art-pieces was as close as one would get to large audiences watching movies in huge move houses fifty years later. It's amazing where we have come, but it would be tragic to lose any of what has passed.

Certainly not everything that is old is always still any good, I mean we can't keep this stuff around forever and a lot of it has outlived its usefulness. It even strikes me that much of this music may be as irrelevant as spending time learning ancient Greek or Latin.

Well, perhaps so, perhaps not. It would be nice to have more people with more time able to devote themselves to these rare corridors of our culture and traditions, simply to uncover what may be interesting to somebody today.

Better yet if the performances can be fresh and …

New? Laughs  That's certainly a challenge, to make something perhaps millions have heard before sound immediate and as timeless as if it had just been realized yesterday.  Imagine what this means for each of the musicians, how much time and attention they must put into each phrase!  The whole process of making music this way is concentrated and it is for pianists anyway, activity which has a notably religious aspect to it.   

That's all there was for this one, unless you have some closing words.

I promise, there will be a tenth interview. Laughs

FINIS

Music of the Great Composers – Franz Liszt (1811-1886)

Though one would have perhaps thought differently about it, and though we have just whizzed through this composer's bicentennial year, this hardly aroused as much public attention as the bicentennial of Chopin a year earlier. Also that same year, the bicentennial of Robert Schumann was given scant attention. Well, as much as it might pain some of the more plain minded, I will make the prediction that Franz Liszt shall have some kind of a come back in the near future, particularly as his music is appreciated for the really forward looking musical material that much of it contains.

Landständischer Saal

Things to note about Liszt: this pre-eminent Hungarian composer was born and raised in Hungary and his competent musician father forbade any use of German while in Hungary, though the family was originally ethnically German. That attitude was prevalent in much of Hungary's history and is not noted much these days where English has become almost a second language there. Liszt's father also knew Haydn, Hummel and Beethoven personally. Now if you were ever going to be a really serious composer, you could not have had better connections at that time than these. Of course, young Franz had amazing musical and pianistic talent and he was strong, tall, good looking, athletic, had great sex-appeal. Liszt at his time, more than anyone else, personified what it meant to play the piano. He was widely travelled and widely heard by adoring people all over Europe from one end of it to the other. He was one of the most widely travelled musicians of his time.

Franz was a child prodigy who was sent to school in Vienna by wealthy patrons. He went to Vienna and studied with Carl Czerny and Antonio Salieri. At age 11, Liszt has his Vienna début at the "Landständischer Saal." During this period of his childhood, Liszt travelled in Austrian and Hungarian aristocratic circles, even met Beethoven and Schubert. This very early success probably aided his natural confidence which was already pretty robust. There was early on a sense that Franz Liszt was somehow personally magnetic, that he could move people; was a natural leader. But if so, he was also clearly a follower, or at least a joiner, one who wanted to belong to something bigger, even to following rules, even to professing obedience (Liszt was a devout Catholic and as well a Mason, as had been both Haydn and Mozart before him.)

Liszt's first published composition, 1823 or 1824:

Liszt-Variationon a Waltz by Diabelli - Leslie Howard, piano

3Variations on a Waltz of Diabelli – Cyprien Katsaris, piano

The familiar Diabelli waltz followed by variations by Anselm Hüttenbrenner, Franz Schubert, and Franz Liszt. Notice the two very different styles of interpreting this piece. Howard's is more traditional while Katsaris' approach is more modern.

Now to top off his years in Vienna, Liszt was destined to spend his teens in Paris! His father may have come on hard times, and he died soon after. But it had been his father's intention to move the family to Paris, and so the young Franz, who had been touring, gave it up and moved to Paris to live with his mother. Franz was busy in Paris, teaching piano and composition (or at least harmony and arranging), keeping weird hours and travelling the length and breadth of the great city. Imagine being in Paris in the 1820's when the latest gadget was the piano and the reigning genius at learning how to play one was the dashing young Hungarian, Franz Lszt! Note the difference between the sickly Chopin who gave lessons where he was and had the draw of a select set whilst the usually robustly healthy Liszt had to teach where he was bidden. Certainly there had to have been many interpersonal encounters of the kind we all call “romantic” during these years. Franz wasn't composing anything during this period either, so what else was he doing, in Paris? Getting an education, no doubt.

Then sometime during this period Liszt has a sort of St. Francis of Assisi experience. He is named for the saint in fact. He got very ill, almost died, and had serious religious / psychical difficulties. He wanted to join the Catholic Church then and there, as a religious; a deacon or even a priest, but at this time, his mother forbade him. Anyway, he recovers his robust health completely. Later in life, he is compelled as it were to join the Church where he does become a deacon.

Then in 1830, a day before the première of Hector Berlioz' Symphonie fantastique, Liszt who is 19, meets Berlioz who is 27. I can just imagine the chemistry. By the time Liszt is 21 he is popularizing Berlioz' work as best he can, at the piano, and at his own expense, as well as making a name for himself on that great stage of the piano which was Paris in the 1830's. During these years Liszt was to be seen in the company of Frédéric Chopin, another influential friend.

Though Liszt really is out of what has come to be called the “First Vienna School” of composition, he was from the beginning really intending to do something completely different. As a prodigious composer, which means there's a lot of Liszt's music that probably few have heard before, Liszt left a lot of very interesting and intense music, especially for the piano, that foreshadows the work of people who came much later, near the end of the 19^th century into the 20^th century, Scriabin, Rachmaninoff and more certainly Ravel. Liszt's influence as a composer and as a piano teacher are significant; most people who can trace their teachers back to Beethoven pass through Czerny and Liszt.

Liszt was of course one of European music's first international superstars, the other being Niccolo Paganini, who may be considered Liszt's inspiration in this regard; if Paganini could wow the crowds, so could he. Liszt's audience was clearly middle class, though the nobility took the lead in supporting him and the proceeds from his tours were enormous. Though he was a year younger than Chopin and Schumann, and younger still than Mendelssohn, Franz Liszt always came across as far more self assured, though a very generous sort of person.  As a pianist he had no serious rivals at all; he had literally the complete technical mastery over his instrument, was known to break many pianos if they were not built to take it. Liszt's level of pianism required the eventual technological changes in design that took place in the piano industry over the first half the 19^th century, including the cast iron plate, action refinements and higher tension scales.

There is usually something that strikes one as fresh and new in a good performance of anything by Liszt. Where Chopin is poetic and Schumann and Mendelssohn majestic or trivial by turns, Liszt is either sparkling or tremulously ferocious in comparison. The trend lately has been for pianists to pursue a far more dispassionate rendition of music by Liszt so that one can easily hear traces of the impressionism of Debussy and Ravel that will follow. Liszt was also hugely influential on the orchestral writing of Richard Wagner and those who came after him, particularly Richard Strauss and Gustav Mahler. What Liszt starts to do early on is to experiment with eluding and sliding tonal centres, changed harmonic contexts, literal flights of harmonic fancy; casual listening does not know what key the piece is in or even how exactly the composer manages to get all the textures and structures to work. It sounds and is technically very difficult, it requires a different kind of concentration to master as a piano student; Liszt's style is characterized by a distinctly double fisted piano technique that requires a total involvement of the pianist with the music in a way almost three times as physically intense as playing anything by Mozart or even Beethoven.

What Liszt was really doing is to use the piano as an orchestra, and he even used it to popularize the orchestral or operatic works of others. Yes, we have a lot of Liszt's transcriptions of works by other famous composers, including some of the great organ works of Bach and all the symphonies of Beethoven. Most of these transcriptions are finally beginning to receive the attention they have long deserved. It might be admitted that this revival is due in part to the pianists (and the pianos) finally being up to the prodigious tasks set for them. We say with pretty complete confidence that one's appreciation for Liszt goes up as one plays him on better pianos. Most uprights really can't do him justice.

Of course Liszt lived a good long 75 years, was composing for most of his life, had a few changes in style along the way, went through his various life stages until he became sort of ascetic near the end. Liszt wasn't the first one, nor certainly the only one, to conceive of his life as an artefact designed by the artist, but that was sort of his intention all his life anyway. As such Liszt provided tremendous grist for the perpetual public craving for fanciful, exotic romance, even of the pulsatingly erotic varieties. Here's an example played by my friend, Violetta Egorova:

Franz Liszt. "Tarantella, Venezia e Napoli" from Les Annees de Pelerinage, 2nd Year: Italy. It was composed 1859.

Liszt also had developed a reputation, at the age of 22 he took up with a woman six years his senior (a usual practice by the way, followed by many prominent artists of the time) who had her own reputation, all of which no doubt helped his box office receipts, and in addition spurred him to greater creative output. But a year later he makes friends with a sickly Catholic mystic and it is sort of this mixture of the erotic and the mystical that characterizes much of Liszt's output. The numerous gossipy stories about him really are less interesting (and in any case they are personal and so beyond the ken of any but the inquisitorial) as the music they helped engender.

So, let's hear some of it, these composed while at the summer residence of another of Liszt's lovers who were usually noble born ladies of leisure married by convenience to their spouses (from which practice comes the notion of noble or at least rich women having “protégés” who they keep). Those of you who patiently listen to all these tracks at one listening will be amazed at both the variety and unity of these works as individual master-works and as members forming a great masterpiece. Those who know the music of later epochs will find their seeds here in this great cycle of pieces which take their inspiration form literary and operatic sources of the times before 1850.

Harmonies Poétiques et Religieuses (1847) [Poetic and religious harmonies]

1. Invocation (Alfred Brendel)
2. AveMaria (Ronald Hawkins)
3. Bénédiction de Dieu dans la solitude [God's blessing in solitude] (Claudio Arrau)

4. Pensée des morts [In memory of the dead] (Alfred Brendel)
5. Pater Noster [The Lord's Prayer] (Andrea Bonatta)*
6. Hymne de l’enfant à son réveil [The Awaking Child’s Hymn] (Andrea Bonatta)*
7. Funérailles [Elegy] (Martha Argerich)
8. Miserere, d’après Palestrina (Andrea Bonatta)*

9. Andante lagrimoso (Sviatoslav Richter)
10. Cantique d’amour [Hymn of Love] (Andrea Bonatta)*

* Performed on the Steingraeber grand piano said to have belonged to Liszt at Weimar.  He owned many pianos during his lifetime, many given to him as gifts from prominent piano manufacturers. 

That last one sounds as though it had inspired Scriabin, but that's for a future time.

Franz Liszt was of course known for some orchestral pieces, which were usually scored based on the usages of the times, especially sources drawn from opera. All these literary and operatic elements were after all fictional representations of some elements within the real societies in which people lived, these were said to be “romantic.” That is what we have been left with by tradition; that all this music, specifically from the 1830's onward, since it depicted fiction, is hence deemed trivial and those engaged in it, whether it is said openly or thought casually, are themselves wasting their time on utter trivialities.

We disagree with the superficial suppositions and saturnine conclusions involved in this traditional view, because we are aware of other elements in the lives of many of these individual composers, many who were actively involved in what would be considered politically subversive ideas or heretical religious views, especially concerning the rights of certain people to rule over other people. We submit that literary and other artistic “fictions” arose in large part due to the need to conceal important ideas the more easily to be disseminated; ideas that people need only to be ruled by themselves, that the rights of authority are and should be fairly weak and always serve the individual, etc. else they are suspect.  Music, which is relatively new in the sense in which we are dealing with it here; written down, composed thereby intended to last, as well as other innovations, usually had to endure the baleful and useless scrutiny of the political and social authorities; those who saw their social position challenged by a rising middle class. The 19^th century saw this struggle for freedom intensify in Europe against a background of entrenched systems of political and religious authority.  In his early life, Liszt -with his notorious private lifestyle, whether it was really very erotic at all- symbolized this struggle in the popular mind.

No matter from which quarter one hears the inevitable jibes and criticisms, the facts are fairly clear that people to this day are moved by much of this “romantic” music. Something resonates in them when they hear it, many international music festivals are predominantly devoted to it. Performances of this music are becoming better and more lucid all the time as they shed the mere trappings of emotion for the basic real thing; musical recreation based on the power of precision and realism. What we would like to establish as the new perspective on this music is that it was not so much "romantic" as it was emotionally realistic.

This was the music of emotional realism, getting as close to how it feels to feel sad, feel bad, really bad, burst into tears, to feel real terror, real pain, real lust, real desire, love in all its aspects from the merely polite to the distinctly erotic. This was music that spoke frankly about war, desolation and death too. This was and is the range of music of emotional realism and Franz Liszt had a major hand in generating it.

We offer an obscure piece by Liszt for your delectation, one composed in 1867 after the death (by firing squad) of Maximilian von Habsburg, the erstwhile puppet Emperor of Mexico. We wonder to which side of this historical figure he might have been most attached. It is from his third book of Years of Pilgrimage ( Années de Pelerinage).

Franz Liszt: Marche funèbre - Années de Pelerinage (Alvaro Ordoñez – Piano)

There's little else like this in the standard piano repertoire. Here we see the emphatic use of the piano as a percussion instrument. Though many would later take this side of pianism up, the beating up of a piano in order to make a musical statement, it all began with Franz Liszt. These late works of his immense output will particularly interest students of the future, for the musical effects Liszt was able to release from the piano are in many ways finding their emotional pedal points in the events of our own times.

Liszt didn't write symphonies, he wrote symphonic poems, thirteen of them.  Most are rarely performed because they are often so formless, mere sketches as if intended for use between scenes of a play or background music for a future movie.  The last one was called Von der Wiege bis zum Grabe (From the Cradle to the Grave) S. 107.  (Liszt's compositions are catalogued these days by Searle numbers or “sig” numbers rather than opus numbers). You would almost automatically think of this music as a film-score for some fanciful cartoon or other motion picture. But this was a while before motion pictures came along. We note that this work was written about the same time as Brahms was writing his second piano concerto and Béla Bartók was born.

Franz Liszt - Von der Wiege bis zum Grabe, S107 (1881-82)

I. Die Wiege (The Cradle)
II. Der Kampf ums Dasein (The Struggle for Existence)

III. Zum Grabe (To the Grave)

This obscure piece was gratefully performed by the Budapest Symphony Orchestra, Arpad Joo, conducting.

Liszt has been a stumbling block for many, easily dismissed and discarded by those who find this or that about him objectionable. He was a product of a tumultuous period of technical and social change, and he was for the most part close to the top of it from which he could observe with his own keen though influenced perspectives. These days any pianist with a better than average technique and a good piano would be tremendously rewarded by a deeper interest in his music. As for the rest of us, since Liszt's output was so vast, we have plenty of music to look forward to as much of it remains unexplored territory to this day.

Liszt's apartment in Budapest.  Not sure how much time he actually spent here, but this is said to be one of his many pianos.  It is known that Liszt was active in certain charitable activities whenever he was in Budapest.

FINIS