Any Interest in a Thread on Classical Pianists & Recordings? - Page 3

Thanks for those recommendations. Most of my Liszt collection is from my grandmother, she had quite a collection of LPs and liked piano concertos the most; Liszt was by far her favorite. I really need to dig those records out of storage, as it's been awhile since we listened together and I do miss them (and my grandmother as well ^-^).

A little more about Franz Liszt:

As a composer, Liszt was one of the most prominent representatives of the "Neudeutsche Schule" ("New German School"); he hailed from Hungary originally.

As a performer, Liszt became renowned throughout Europe during the 19th century for his great skill. He was said by his contemporaries to have been the most technically advanced pianist of his age and perhaps the greatest pianist of all time.

There are few, if any, good sources that give an impression of how Liszt really sounded from the 1820s. Carl Czerny, an Austrian pianist, composer and Liszt's teacher, claimed Liszt was a natural who played according to feeling, and reviews of his concerts especially praise the brilliance, strength and precision in his playing. At least one critic also mentions his ability to absolutely never change tempo, which may be due to his father's insistence that he practice with a metronome.

Liszt was also quite an accomplished author, with many published essays on the arts; he also wrote a book about Chopin, as well as a book about the Romanis (Gypsies) and their music in Hungary.

In the 1860's he suffered debilitating personal tragedies in his life, and entered a monastery of the Franciscan order where excelled as a monk. On April 25, 1865, he received the tonsure at the hands of Cardinal Hohenlohe; following this he was sometimes called the Abbé Liszt. He received the four minor orders on July 31, 1865, porter, lector, exorcist!, and acolyte.

As a piano teacher, quite a few of his students went on to successful performance careers of their own.

Every now and then I take a path off the beaten track and listen to Gould's recordings of the five Beethoven concertos and his Mozart / Beethoven sonatas. Not to everyone's taste but it does break the monotony of a Kempff or Brendel recording.

Has anyone heard "Beethoven and the Natural World"? It's a lightweight overview of his "greatest hits", interspersed with nature sounds, and I think it works, for what it is. My sister gave it to me out of the blue one Christmas, and and even though it isn't quite appropriate for serious music appreciation-type listening, I find it quite relaxing and enjoyable. I think it is part of a series that highlights different composers.


Thanks for that, I will look into both of those as I don't have much of Liszt's work on CD, and I do really like Paganini as well.


edit: wow, that movie sounds great, but not from Netflix as the VHS seems way better than the DVD release according to reviews from Amazon, so I bought a "like new" used VHS copy for $5. If you have only seen the DVD version, you might want to check out these reviews.

Everyone buys Gould for the humming. Yes I do have Argerich as well. It's funny the comments you made about her playing apply equally as well to Gould, in a weird sort of way. Glenn Gould: Hereafter is a great documentary on Gould by Bruno Monsaingeon and one I would heartily recommend, regardless whether one likes or dislikes his work.

I am made to believe that he actually did it subconsciously and at some point tried to eliminate it but failed miserably. But for someone who was pitch perfect yes he could have done a better job humming in tune.

And as for Gould, wearing a wool jacket and gloves in Summer (he had a phobia about getting an infection); sitting on the same (very low) piano stool throughout his career; an obsession with studio recording and forsaking all concerts throughout the latter part of his career; and, last but not least, writing that famous fugue

YouTube - Glenn Gould talks about So You Want to Write a Fugue

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=u6hQnBc5sQU&feature=fvw

Gould definitely wins the prize for most eccentric concert pianist. While Horowitz had eccentricites, when he played you only noticed the music. GG on the other hand, his posture, humming and completely original interpretations...