Franz Liszt
3 Concert Etudes
S. 144

About Franz Liszt's 3 Concert Etudes

After a decade of constant travelling, building a virtuoso career unmatched in the history of musical performance, Liszt entered a more settled period in 1848. Encouraged by his new partner Carolyne zu Sayn-Wittgenstein, he started concentrating on composing. Soon after taking up residence in Weimar he finished the studies known today as Il lamento (Lament), La leggierezza (Lightness) and Un sospiro (A Sigh).

Unlike Liszt's early studies that concentrated more on piano technique, the new concert studies are dominated by poetic ideas and tonal concept. The concluding study, with its constant hand-crossings and lovely pentatonic melody, is the most well-known of the three.