Classical Music | Piano Music

Recorded on 03/15/2009, uploaded on 09/02/2009

Musician's or Publisher's Notes

Premiered in Weimar on February 17, 1855 with the composer himself at the piano and Hector Berlioz leading the orchestra, Liszt’s First Piano Concerto suffered a long, protracted genesis. The first sketches of its main themes date from 1830 when Liszt was only nineteen years of age. Yet, he did commence serious work on the concerto until the 1840s. Already relishing in his reputation as Europe’s greatest piano virtuoso, Liszt’s fame thus far as a composer hinged virtually on his piano solo works and he had not yet conquered the numerous sounds capable from the orchestra. Knowing his weakness, Liszt called on his pupil, Joachim Raff, to help with the orchestration. Completed in 1849, Liszt continued to revise the work until its premiere in 1855, and even more until its publication the following year.

As one would expect from Liszt, the Piano Concerto No. 1 in E-flat major reinterprets the structures handed down to him from the masters of the Classical era. Like his Piano Sonata in B minor, the Concerto is cast, essentially, as a four-movement work, played without breaks, fused into single structure. The first movement, an Allegro maestoso, begins in a purely Lisztian fashion with the entire work’s motivic kernel announced by the full-force of the strings and answered by a thunderous eruption of octaves from the piano. This vigorous theme is later answered by a lyrical duet between piano and clarinet. The following Quasi Adagio turns more serene, shifting to the key of B major and introducing an expansive lyrical subject in the strings and answered by the piano.

Following the hushed close of the second movement is the scherzo-like Allegretto vivace. A sprightly and jocular movement, it employs the added sound of triangle. In fact, the prominent part given to it drew the contempt of Eduard Hanslick at the premiere dubbing the work “Liszt’s Triangle Concerto.” The melodic material from the opening of the first movement returns to form the basis of the movement’s close before it culminates on a discordant diminished seventh chord, preparing the arrival of the finale. Marked Allegro marziale animato, the finale provides an energetic conclusion to the Concerto and draws its thematic material together.  With vigorous chromatic scales and triumphal chords, Liszt concludes the Concerto in his signature heroic and bombastic manner.      Joseph DuBose

Live with City of Nevers Symphony Orchestra (France), dir.Michelle Ambrozetti