Classical Music | Piano Music

Recorded on 07/26/2005, uploaded on 01/23/2009

Musician's or Publisher's Notes

Besides his own prolific output, Franz Liszt fashioned other composer’s works into pieces for the piano, making many of them accessible to a wider audience. In the case of his famous transcriptions of Beethoven’s symphonies or of Schubert’s lieder, these arrangements remained relatively true to the originals. With other composer’s works, such as Verdi, Liszt drew freely from the melodic material of his contemporaries, creating dazzling pieces of showmanship. Inevitably, this but only aided the reputation of those composers whose music Liszt borrowed but perhaps damaged his own by giving his critics more reason to accuse him of writing unsubstantial and artistically shallow concert music. In 1859, Liszt crafted three pieces based on selections from Verdi’s operas. Dubbed “paraphrases,” they were premiered during a series of concerts given by Hans von Bülow in Berlin.

The Concert Paraphrase of “Rigoletto” is based on the famous quartet “Bella figlia dell’amore” from the opera’s final act. The quartet comes at a dramatic point in the opera in which the womanizing Duke of Mantua, courting his latest conquest Maddalena, is unknowingly watched by his hunch-backed court jester Rigoletto and his daughter Gilda, who is hopelessly in love with the Duke. Appalled at the Duke’s licentiousness, Rigoletto vows to hire an assassin and have him killed. Liszt’s treatment of Verdi’s melodic material encompasses the range of emotions inherent in the scene. Framed by an introduction and coda fashioned out of the principle melodies, Verdi’s music is shaped by Liszt into a brilliant pianistic discourse, aptly suited to its expressive capabilities and sonority.       Joseph DuBose

_____________________________________________________________________

Franz Liszt and Italy

"The beautiful in this special land became evident to me in its purest and most sublime form. Art in all its splendor disclosed itself to my eyes. It revealed its universality and unity to me. Day by day my feelings and thoughts gave me a better insight into the hidden relationship that unites all works of genius. Raphael and Michelangelo increased my understanding of Mozart and Beethoven; Giovanni Pisano, Fra Beato, and Il Francia explained Allegri, Marcello and Palestrina to me. Titian and Rossini appeared to me like twin stars shining with the same light. The Colosseum and the Campo Santo are not as foreign as one thinks to the Eroica Symphony and the Requiem. Dante has found his pictorial expression in Orcagna and Michelangelo, and someday perhaps he will find his musical expression in the Beethoven of the future."

Liszt's words are a clear example of his love for Italy. In his later years, during the period that eminent scholar Alan Walker calls "a threefold life," when Liszt divided his time among Rome, Weimar and Budapest, Rome was always a special, spiritual place for Liszt, a devout Catholic. Today's recital is dedicated to Italy as a source of inspiration in Liszt's piano works, and covers a wide range of his artistic output.

Paraphrase on Quartet from Verdi's Rigoletto

Liszt's admiration for Verdi's operas is evident in the number of transcriptions and paraphrases he wrote... The Rigoletto Paraphrase was composed in 1859 and uses the famous quartet Bella figlia dell'amore from the last act of the opera.    Alexandre Dossin

Courtesy of International Music Foundation.