We know Franz Liszt was the "inventor" of the piano recital. But, what does it mean really?
Well, in other words, he was the first pianist to perform alone on stage, playing all the "numbers" himself. It was 1840 and from then on "collective" concerts went down in history, which along with soloists could include ensembles of the most diverse instruments, as well as a couple of arias performed by the divas of the moment so as not to bore the audience with so much instrumental timbre.
The transcriptions
For this, the artist needed a vast repertoire. Hopefully, of well-known melodies. Then came the piano transcriptions of orchestral works, fantasies on opera themes, and variations on popular motifs.
Liszt, the mass artist of the 19th century, would play them all, always taking care to reserve as a grand finale a piece that would drive the ladies present even madder, ladies and young ladies who might come to blows for the handkerchief thrown to the audience by the charming twenty-nine-year-old artist.
A "bravura" fantasy on a famous Spanish air never failed him.
Rondeau fantastique sur un théme espagnol (A Fantastic Rondo on a Spanish Theme)
This is its original title. And the Spanish theme is the famous pole Yo que soy contrabandista, one of the musical numbers of El poeta calculista, a work by the tenor and composer Manuel García premiered in Madrid in 1805. Liszt composed the rondo in 1836, and was published the following year simultaneously in Leipzig, Milan, and Paris.
Three years earlier, Chopin had dedicated to Liszt the Etudes of Opus 10. He could have reciprocated with this dedication, but the Hungarian master must have considered that one thing was not compatible with the other. It is dedicated, then, to George Sand, who will become Chopin's "friend" only the following year.
The intricacies
Its technical difficulties are grandiose, and the number of pianists who have dared to record it, let alone perform it in public, can be counted on the fingers of one hand. The Russian concert pianist Mikhail Pletnev tried it, but ended up giving up when he saw that the piece was "untouchable," as he put it. Of course, it is also possible that the technical paraphernalia alone has failed to excite many performers of recognized virtuosity.
Courageous Valentina
There are live versions on Youtube in formal settings (Bruni, Howard), but we have preferred to show here the very informal performance, very democratic and far from any divism, that the Ukrainian pianist Valentina Lisitsa decided to offer in a London train station, on an upright piano somewhat out of tune and which apparently has a key that doesn't work. Bravo for the audacity.
