Liszt Sonata

[piano32]

pretty good Liszt sonata on youtube (great videowork)
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=1CBbrqfWZ7c

Funny wrong octave after a while...

[amelie72]

This is AWESOME playing, I think. I could not care less that there is one octave wrongly hit. After that, he just steams it up even more, we could all learn from that.

[thalberg]

Per Tengstrand actually won first place in the Cleveland International Piano Competition quite a while back.  I heard his name a lot, but this is the first I've seen of him.  Thank you for posting this.  It's great playing.

[southsweden]

I just posted on the poll on being hunched over in the miscellaneous section...as said there, this guy has changed quite a lot and in Master Class he was constantly pulling back the student's shoulder. He played the Brahms 3rd sonata and was mostly playing with a great posture (some spots he did lean over, but not a lot). I for one think it's NOT good to hunch over.

[daniloperusina]

He's very famous in sweden. He had his 'breakthrough' about 15 years ago, and was very good already then. He was like the star of the nation, everybody talked about him, like 'Have you heard Tengstrand', 'Yeah, fantastic'
Actually, they still talk about him..

[southsweden]

There was a film about him on Swedish TV some years ago - a clip can be seen on
http://www.autoimages.se/produktioner/dokumentarfilm/solisten/
see up in the right corner. It's too short, would like to hear more Tjajkovsky!

[amelie72]

Great to see that they make piano documentaries on television these days, seems like a well-done film. Anyone seen it (the whole thing?)

[elevateme_returns]

what's the story behind the liszt sonata? ive heard it once but forgotten

[amelie72]

You mean a story behind the music itself? I don't think there is one "sanctioned" by Liszt, or is there?

[ramseytheii]

what's the story behind the liszt sonata? ive heard it once but forgotten

Here are some quotes from Arrau's book which was just mentioned in the "Bebung effect" thread.  Arrau studied with Martin Krause, a student of Liszt's, and is being interviewed by Joseph Horowitz:

JH: To what extent to you apply a Faustian scenario in working out your interpretation?  Do you think in terms of Faust and Gretchen and Mephistopheles?

CA: Definitely.  This was something that was taken for granted among Liszt's pupils.

JH: ...to what extent do you assign different passages to different characters?
(quotes the first passage in double octaves)

CA: That is definitely Mephisto.  This (quotes the main theme in the LH) is also an aspect of Mephisto.  And this (quotes the agitato after the introduction) is like a vision of hell - such incredible wailing.

JH: And the big passage in double octaves?

CA: That is the apparent triumph of Mephisto.  This of course, is the majesty of the Almighty: (the grandioso theme).

And then out of the Mephisto theme comes Gretchen, with the same melodic line, but a completely different character - sort of pleading to be spared or saved.

etc.  It's an interesting read.  He goes through several more points of the piece, quoting the music and ascribing characters to it.  At the end, they come to this:

==
JH: What do you make of the very las tnote of the piece, the low B which you play so suddenly?

CA: The whole vision is wiped out.

JH: It is like waking from a dream?

CA: Exactly.
==


Walter Ramsey

[piano32]

Thanks for sharing that, very interesting. I have that book (think it's out of print now) and it's really good except for JH trying sometimes a little to hard to be on par with Arrau.

The statement about the last low B made me go back and look at the youtube to see how Tengstrand plays it. I liked it, it's more like a scary, far-away reminder of darkness, which comes after the heavenly chords. Anybody has other thoughts on that last B?

[ramseytheii]

Thanks for sharing that, very interesting. I have that book (think it's out of print now) and it's really good except for JH trying sometimes a little to hard to be on par with Arrau.

The statement about the last low B made me go back and look at the youtube to see how Tengstrand plays it. I liked it, it's more like a scary, far-away reminder of darkness, which comes after the heavenly chords. Anybody has other thoughts on that last B?

I wanted to post in addition to my previous, Alfred Brendel's comments about it, but somehow I couldn't find them.  I don't remember his exact words, but it was something along the lines of, someone asked him how he felt about the last note, if it was an awakening from a dream, and he said something like, no, and I hate it when people think that.

It isn't in his "Why me" book, can anyone find where he is quoted about that?

Walter Ramsey

[piano32]

One way to look at it could be to relate to the first two octave Gs in the piece. At the end, those dark forces are now tamed into a harmonious B with the previous chords...