Wherein We Elect Our Favourite Classical Compositions of… the 1850s

I adore Liszt's Piano Sonata and all things late Schumann (especially the Geistervariationen, which is a suitably unsettling testament) but… Tristan und Isolde is on the list and for all my misgivings towards opera in general and Wagner in particular, it's a work that may rightly be described as epochal. I'll mull it over.

*which are a suitably unsettling, etc…

I really want to brush up on my Liszt. Any specific recommendation for a good recording of the Piano Sonata?

Can't go wrong with Sviatoslav Richter. I'm a big fan of Krystian Zimerman, Markus Groh and Paul Lewis's takes, as well.

I almost forgot: Dénes Várjon is no less incredible (on an ECM disc that also features Berg's Piano Sonata and Janáček's In the Mists – truly wonderful stuff).

Some more recording suggestions:

Amédée Méreaux - Grandes Etudes pour le piano, Op. 63 – there is in fact no available complete recording of this cycle but I included it because the excerpts I've heard on YT are quite fascinating in their über-transcendental virtuosity, as though the aim were to out-Alkan Alkan
Charles-Valentin Alkan - Marc-André Hamelin for all three works
Franz Liszt - Piano Sonata in B minor – see above posts
Franz Liszt - Années de pèlerinage, 1ère année – Suisse – Bertrand Chamayou
Franz Liszt - Faust Symphony – Berliner Philharmoniker, Daniel Barenboim
Johannes Brahms - Piano Sonata No. 3 in F minor, Op. 5 – Radu Lupu
Johannes Brahms - Piano Trio No. 1 in B major/minor, Op. 8 – Trio Wanderer
Johannes Brahms - 4 Ballades, Op. 10 – Emil Gilels
Johannes Brahms - Piano Concerto No. 1 in D minor, Op. 15 – Maurizio Pollini, Berliner Philharmoniker, Claudio Abbado
Richard Wagner - Tristan und Isolde – M. Price, R. Kollo, B. Fassbaender, D. Fischer-Dieskau, K. Moll, Staatskapelle Dresden, C. Kleiber
Robert Schumann - Symphony No. 3 in E-flat major, Op. 97 – WDR Sinfonieorchester Köln, Heinz Holliger
Robert Schumann - Violin Sonata No. 1 in A minor, Op. 105 – Carolin Widmann, Dénes Várjon
Robert Schumann - Märchenbilder, Op. 113 – Tabea Zimmermann, Hartmut Höll
Robert Schumann - Symphony No. 4 in D minor, Op. 120 – WDR Sinfonieorchester Köln, Heinz Holliger
Robert Schumann - Violin Sonata No. 2 in D minor, Op. 121 – Carolin Widmann, Dénes Várjon
Robert Schumann - Gesänge der Frühe, Op. 133 – Piotr Anderszewski
Robert Schumann - Geistervariationen – András Schiff

I did wonder about the Méreaux etudes. I could find 5 on Spotify (Cyprien Katsaris), of seemingly 60. Intriguing.

Another playlist, generally reflecting the above wherever possible!
https://open.spotify.com/playlist/2OjMdxYODdtM105rdbtSqx

Thanks you Pom and Nag!

this decade is a bit of a blind spot for me but i like that first brahms piano trio

Not going to pretend to know the majority of these works but this is probably Tristan vs Die Walkure; the instrumental passages and third act of the former may win it. Will at least go over more of the Liszt before voting, though.

I'm not real experienced with classical/romantic music generally, so I've probably heard three of these (including the two operas from the Ring cycle that I listened to for the first time a couple weeks ago). I did like Rattle's Schumann 4, so I'm going with that. I'll listen to that recording of Tristan soon; I liked both of the other operas from the era, and I've heard Tristan described as a four hour dominant chord that resolves to the minor tonic (spoilers!).

liszt's faust symphony (which i studied for music a-level)* is the model for and better than all of wagner i will die on this hill (tho not on this poll, polls are bad)

also bits of berlioz enfance du christ are also better than all of wagner and if the whole of it is too long probably that's even more true of wagner obv

*i did badly what of it, it was the summer pf punk

These polls are really helping to remind me how heavily my knowledge of the repertoire is slanted towards the 20th century.

i was a bit obsessed with alkan as a teenager though heard very little of his music (there was none in the school library) -- a specialist virtuoso whose name i forget gave a local performance of some of his works and my grandparents took me, i'm guessing this is where my interest started (the music was difficult and grandly gloomy iirc)

the main thing i recall abt the performance was that the virtuoso played on a large bosendorfer with an extra length keyboard (two additional bass notes, i guess G and F), and it had a little lid or panel you could open or close depending on whether you needed to play the notes or not be distracted and disoriented by the keyboard being the wrong size. anyway someone left the panel in the wrong position and the virtuoso didn't spot it till he started playing, and was clearly bothered and kept glancing at it -- then after the interval he explained the issue to everyone, which is why i know

the other thing i recall is that alkan was a bit of a weirdo recluse and died when he reached for his talmud and pulled the whole bookcase down on top of himself (which seems a pity and may be a made-up tale)

Mark S otm - give your Tristan vote to Faust and cut out the middleman, people.

OK, those are strong words. I actually don't recall if I know that piece but I'll definitely listen before voting.

I favor the Ivan Fischer recording and the first Bernstein one (with the NYPO)

I second the Iván Fischer (can't stand Bernstein).

I might just go with Liszt's Piano Sonata in the end.

Where are all the Verdi stans btw? I'm no fan but Rigoletto, Il trovatore and La traviata are as canonical as it gets.

the other thing i recall is that alkan was a bit of a weirdo recluse and died when he reached for his talmud and pulled the whole bookcase down on top of himself (which seems a pity and may be a made-up tale)

So I've heard as well and it does have all the trappings of Romantic legend. According to Wikipedia:

For many years it was believed that Alkan met his death when a bookcase toppled over and fell on him as he reached for a volume of the Talmud from a high shelf. This tale, which was circulated by the pianist Isidor Philipp, is dismissed by Hugh Macdonald, who reports the discovery of a contemporary letter by one of his pupils explaining that Alkan had been found prostrate in his kitchen, under a porte-parapluie (a heavy coat/umbrella rack), after his concierge heard his moaning. He had possibly fainted, bringing it down on himself while grabbing out for support. He was reportedly carried to his bedroom and died later that evening. The story of the bookcase may have its roots in a legend told of Aryeh Leib ben Asher, rabbi of Metz, the town from which Alkan's family originated.

OK, that symphony (Fischer recording) was great on first casual listen and is a serious contender (although the Années... from this decade also v good). If we're comparing to Wagner, I actually like getting lost in 3-4h of gelatinous vocal melodrama in a language I don't understand is the thing, but, as a symphony, that was a fantastic work.

Liszt can be very uneven but the Faust Symphony is top drawer material. His orchestration of From the Cradle to the Grave is excellent as well (but I'm getting ahead of myself).

yes i think it's actually the only thing i like by him

You dislike his austere & mournful late works?

(Unless you were specifically referring to From the Cradle to the Grave).

wasn't very clear there -- there's a lot by him i've never heard, i like faust much more than whatever else i have heard

(and mostly heard a long time ago, so my mind is probably very changeable these days on stuff i disliked in my 20s)

Then I hope you'll give him a second chance once we reach the 1880s.

i'll make a liszt list encompassing all his eras once we get to the 1880s and try to keep it short

So Liszt's very first published work was *his* variation on that theme of Diabelli's. Interesting.

I'm enjoying spending quality time with his solo piano works, not least Harmonies poétiques et religieuses. I think the only Liszt I'd have previously said I know 'well' amounted to a few discs of tone poems, etc. (Shocking confession #647959)

Harmonies Poetiques is an awesome cycle. The benediction gets all the air time but pensees des morts is probably the highlight. I love the opening invocation as well. Brendel did not record the whole cycle but he did most of it and that’s probably my favorite recording of these pieces. Along with a late (1980s) Richter performance of pensees des morts which I assume is in print somewhere.

Don't forget Funérailles! I love them all, though, including his rewriting of Allegri's Miserere.

(adding: my youthful stance on liszt may well have been coloured by roger daltrey's portrayal of same, and the fact that i encountered said portrayal in a seaside cinema WITH MY PARENTS AND SISTER)

It is understandable, roger daltrey is gross

I haven't seen said film but was made aware of its inflammatory reputation at a young age, and it rubbed off on the conception I developed of its subject, whose music I subsequently discovered through the 1st Piano Concerto and its more flagrant bravura passages (I knew nothing of cyclical form at the time). Then I came across Nuages gris, La lugubre gondola, Unstern! Sinistre, disastro and RW – Venezia, all of which sounded like sealed-off mausoleums, to be reverberated into nothingness, completely overturning my vitalist understanding of his music in the process.

Automatic thread bump. This poll is closing tomorrow.

Automatic thread bump. This poll's results are now in.

I suppose the turnout was to be expected. I wonder who voted for Brahms's 1st Piano Trio? Good piece, that.

That Brahms trio and the Brahms first concerto are both totally plausible choices

His third piano sonata kicks ass too, a young man’s Hammerklavier sonata of sorts