Book contents
- Frontmatter
- 1 Liszt: the Romantic artist
- 2 Inventing Liszt's life: early biography and autobiography
- 3 Liszt and the twentieth century
- 4 Liszt's early and Weimar piano works
- 5 Liszt's late piano works: a survey
- 6 Liszt's late piano works: larger forms
- 7 Liszt's piano concerti: a lost tradition
- 8 Performing Liszt's piano music
- 9 Liszt's Lieder
- 10 Liszt's symphonic poems and symphonies
- 11 Liszt's sacred choral music
- Notes
- Select bibliography
- Index of Liszt’s musical works
- General index
10 - Liszt's symphonic poems and symphonies
Published online by Cambridge University Press: 28 September 2011
- Frontmatter
- 1 Liszt: the Romantic artist
- 2 Inventing Liszt's life: early biography and autobiography
- 3 Liszt and the twentieth century
- 4 Liszt's early and Weimar piano works
- 5 Liszt's late piano works: a survey
- 6 Liszt's late piano works: larger forms
- 7 Liszt's piano concerti: a lost tradition
- 8 Performing Liszt's piano music
- 9 Liszt's Lieder
- 10 Liszt's symphonic poems and symphonies
- 11 Liszt's sacred choral music
- Notes
- Select bibliography
- Index of Liszt’s musical works
- General index
Summary
When I look back upon your activity in these last years, you appear superhuman to me; there is something very strange about this. However, it is very natural that creating is our only joy, and alone makes life bearable to us. We are what we are only while we create; all the other functions of life have no meaning for us, and are at the bottom concessions to the vulgarity of ordinary human existence, which can give us no satisfaction.
(richard wagner to liszt, 7 june 1855)During his tenure at the court of Weimar, Franz Liszt focused much of his creative energy towards composing orchestral music, primarily his symphonic poems and symphonies. Liszt received the title of Court Kapellmeister Extraordinary on 2 November 1842 and eventually moved to Weimar in 1848 with Carolyne zu Sayn-Wittgenstein. As Detlef Altenburg outlines in his article ‘Franz Liszt and the Legacy of the Classical Era’, Liszt and Grand Duke Carl Alexander viewed Liszt's appointment as in artistic succession to Johann Wolfgang von Goethe (1775–1832) rather than the previous most celebrated Kapellmeister, Johann Nepomuk Hummel (1819–37). In this spirit, Liszt organised several festivals celebrating German artists in Weimar, beginning with the Goethe Festival in August 1849. Many of Liszt's symphonic poems, symphonies and other orchestral works are products of his aim to revive the ‘Weimar spirit’. Even the works that are not directly connected to a Weimar figure are still part of his desire to reignite the creativity associated with the Goethezeit. In addition, Liszt considered his orchestral compositions to be a continuation of Beethoven's achievement. According to a view strongly held by Liszt and Wagner, the symphony – with the exception of Berlioz – had become stagnant after Beethoven. Liszt saw it as his mission to take orchestral composition further along the path initiated by the great symphonist.
- Type
- Chapter
- Information
- The Cambridge Companion to Liszt , pp. 206 - 222Publisher: Cambridge University PressPrint publication year: 2005