Classical Music | Piano Music

Recorded on 09/16/2009, uploaded on 12/09/2009

Musician's or Publisher's Notes

More so in centuries past than in modern times when a composer borrowed another composer’s melody it was considered a flattering complement and classical music is full of such examples from Bach to Mahler. Yet, perhaps no other composer handed out as many compliments as Franz Liszt. Liszt actively worked to promote the music of other composers, mostly his contemporaries, and often did so by transcribing their music in one way or another for piano. His piano renditions of Beethoven’s symphonies and a number of Schubert’s lieder are examples that can legitimately be called transcriptions. However, in many cases Liszt’s treatment was often exceedingly free, ranging from essentially loose transcriptions to nearly bordering on original compositions based merely on borrowed tunes. These former he called “paraphrases,” as with his three transcriptions from Verdi operas; the latter, “reminiscences,” as with his piece based on tunes from Bellini’s Norma.

Dedicated to Camilla Pleyel, a talented piano virtuoso in her own right, who had asked of Liszt a challenging piece, Reminiscences of Norma was composed in 1841, alongside his Reminiscences of Don Giovanni, based on the famous opera by Mozart, and Reminiscences of Robert the Devil, after the opera by Meyerbeer. Based on seven tunes from Norma which effectively summarize the opera’s entire plot, Liszt crafts a colorful piece in his characteristic virtuoso style and deftly makes Bellini’s melodies to sound if they were secretly intended, not for the voice, but the piano. The lengthy first section draws on the three melodies—the chorus Norma viene (Norma comes), Orovesco’s Ite sul colle (Go to the hills), and, lastly, another chorus, Dell’aura tua profetica (From your prophetic inspiration)—the last of which is subjected to an extensive discourse. Prefaced by a brief quasi-recitative, a shift to B minor marks the second major section of the piece drawing on Norma’s Deh! Non volerli vittime (Oh, let them not be victims), the duet Qual cor tradisti (What heart you betrayed) and Padre, tu piangi? (Father, do you weep?). This final melody is interrupted by the stirring music of Guerra, Guerra, marking the final and third section of the piece. Padre, tu piangi? returns once more as Liszt nears the close and ingeniously juxtaposes it with the melody from Dell’aura tua profectica. But, in true Lisztian fashion, Reminiscences ends with a flurry of notes as a final statement of Guerra, Guerra is used to create the piece’s exciting and dramatic end.      Joseph DuBose

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Reminiscences of Norma by Bellini               Franz Liszt  

Franz Liszt's piano fantasy on one of the greatest bel canto operas, Vincenzo Bellini's Norma, was composed only ten years after the opera itself.  Liszt regularly performed Reminiscences de Norma during his brief career as a concert pianist, and although it is predictably virtuosic, with thundering octaves and sweeping arpeggiation throughout, it was conceived as much more than just a technical showcase.  Liszt does not merely transcribe the seven themes that he chose from the opera, but rather transforms and develops them, creating a carefully structured work that builds in intensity and developmental complexity until the themes are contrapuntally combined in the brilliant coda.     Janice Fehlauer

Courtesy of International Music Foundation.