Liszt’s “Other” Cycle of Solo Piano Music

courtesy of Naxos of America

Franz Liszt tends to be best known for individual compositions for solo piano. There are, of course, the nineteen “Hungarian Rhapsody” works; but these were conceived and composed separately between 1839 and 1847. Where a “cycle” of compositions is concerned, most listeners would think of the three suites with the common title Années de pèlerinage (years of pilgrimage), each suite accounting for a different “year.” Ironically, the first two of those “years” were composed during a single span of time between 1837 and 1859, the latter being the year in which the second Italie (Italy) suite was extended with the three pieces in the Venezia e Napoli (Venice and Naples) collection. The final “year” was then composed between 1872 and 1877.

However, in 1847 Liszt divided his time between Italie and the final version of another cycle, Harmonies poétiques et religieuses (poetic and religious harmonies), which had occupied his attention on and off from 1833. That cycle tends to be known only for the seventh of its ten pieces, “Funérailles” (funeral). At the beginning of last month, Steinway & Sons released a two-CD album of the complete collection. The entire recording was captured in Steinway Hall on September 19, 2019.

One would probably be justified in wondering whether a single pianist could do justice to these ten technically demanding compositions over the course of one day. Indeed, this occurred to the album’s producer, Jon Feidner. His solution was to take a “tag team” approach to recording those ten works. Pianists Jenny Lin and Adam Tendler each recorded five of the compositions over the course of that single day in September.

The result is a little over 80 minutes of Liszt’s solo piano music given a highly satisfying technical account. Both pianists also knew how to capture the different dispositions of expressiveness that cut across the entire cycle. The good news, however, is that neither of them tried to carry that expressiveness “over the top.” Everyone involved with the project seemed to appreciate that, even when limited to only five of the ten pieces, the pianist had to hold back any urges to overplay the emotional undercurrents.

Nevertheless, I suspect that few listeners will take the trouble to listen to all ten of these compositions in a single sitting. Each of the two CDs has an overall duration that will probably be at least tolerable for most listeners. However, there is much to recommend taking a long break before advancing from one CD to another.