The Eighth Tribe, 1975 (2. évfolyam, 1-12. szám)
1975-02-01 / 2. szám
February, 1975 THE EIGHTH TRIBE Page Eieren established in 1870 — now known as Liszt Music Academy. Members of the first teaching staff were: Liszt, president; Ferenc Erkel, dean; Robert Volkman and Kornél Ábrqnyi, Sr. professors. # * * Because of a hostile demonstration at the premiere of The Barber of Baghdad by Peter Cornelius, in 1858, Liszt resigned his position at Weimar. At least, that was the reason he gave. Liszt was no longer happy at Weimar. His first employer, the Grand Duke Charles Frederick, had given him complete authority and a generous budget. But Charles Frederick died in 1853 and his successor, the Grand Duke Charles Alexander, showed little interest in music. Nor was the Grand Duke happy with the expense of the orchestra and opera house. Liszt’s position was not improved by the presence of his mistress. When the Cornelius opera was booed, Liszt knew that the demonstration was as much directed against himself as against the composer. But although Liszt relinquished his duties as director of music, he retained close ties with Weimar. Late in life Liszt began a group of curious experiments. In such piano pieces as the Czardas macabre and Nuages gris, virtuosity is all but eliminated. Harmonies are dissonant, bare, and open. Impressionism and even expressionism are suggested. In recent years there has been considerable study of these late pieces of Liszt. In them are the seeds of Debussy, Bartók, and the other modems. They remain largely unknown, for very few pianists play them in public. Many are sketches rather than fully worked-out compositions. But they are prophetic and even spooky: the old Liszt idly sketching music that hints at a world still unknown, merely to amuse himself, not caring if the music was ever played or, indeed, ever saw the light. Liszt in his old age was an institution. He was constantly surrounded by young pianists, young composers, journalists, sycophants, and hangers-on. Occasionally he would appear in public, and he still had the ability to make his listeners swoon. Nor did age, white hair, and a notable collection of warts dim the ardent lover in him. Women remained attracted to the great man, and there was a fine scandal when his pupil, the rich Olga Janina (“the Cossack Countess”) tried to shoot him and then herself. His life was constantly being discussed. Everything about the man was of interest to a gossip-hungry world. Was it in memory of the D’Agoult or some other episode that Liszt wrote the sentimental piano pieces, the “Liebestraume,” (Dream of Love) of which the one in A flat is the most famous? She was but one of the hundred eager women who pursued that amiable and fascinating man over hill and dale. Liszt supplied pianists with a very popular composition which begins dreamily, mounts to a passionate climax, and after a brilliant display passage subsides with peaceful echoes of the initial song. To understand fully the complex character of the man and his art we must remember that he was Hungarian with the passionate and electrical temperament of his countrymen. Liszt grew up with the sound of the music of the Hungarian gypsies in his ears. The excitement of the national dances was in his veins, also the languor, the rhythmic capriciousness, the pulsing force of his race. It is generally agreed that in his compositions for the piano he seldom surpassed the originality and fascination of the Hungarian rhapsodies. Of these there are in all fourteen. The second Hungarian Rhapsody is perhaps the most famous of the entire group, a gorgeous piece, with a proud, somber introduction, then flourishes and cadenzas much as a wandering gipsy might make with his bow, then a gradual quickening of the pace, sudden, capricious alternations of tenderness and frenzy, and an ending which is one mad whirl of tone. Another of the rhapsodies which seems never to pall is the Twelfth. It has a leading motive of great, crashing chords. They are part of the customary slow introduction which is found in so many of these compositions, and has its analogy in the Hungarian folkdances themselves. Then come typical dance tunes, faster and faster, now and again interrupted by a return of the reverberating chords of the opening. A work of the same description as the foregoing piece, but even more effective because it combines the resources of the orchestra with those of the piano, is the Hungarian Fantasy for piano solo and orchestra. One of the very few records successfully made of this style of composition displays not only the breath-taking virtuosity of the pianist, but also the wonderful way in which Liszt could combine his instruments. A very old, ancestral Hungarian melody, a noble, melancholy call, resounds from the brass instruments. The piano ornaments this strain with all kinds of florid passage-work. Effects of strange pulsatile instruments are suggested in the quicker dance rhythms that follow. The main motive returns —the old Hungarian song—while the pianist sweeps wildly the entire range of the keyboard. Thereafter it is give and take between soloist and orchestra, that vie with each other in speed, in power, and
