Franz Liszt
Transcriptions of other composers' works

About Franz Liszt's Transcriptions of other composers' works

Transcriptions played an important part in shaping Liszt´s role as leading musical figure of his generation.
The first pianist to play the entire range of the keyboard repertory from Bach to Chopin, his historical curiosity and ambitions did not stop there. He transcribed both famous and less well known vocal and orchestral works of others in order to promote the music, and in order to challenge himself to enrich the field of piano techniques.
In orchestral transcriptions, such as the Beethoven Symphonies, Liszt strived to create a sound that would reflect the colour of the various instruments, while the song transcriptions show remarkable inventiveness in  preserving both the vocal line and the full richness of the accompaniment.