Beethoven-Wagner 9th symphony

[liszt1022]

I just came back from my university's library, we have a score of Beethoven's 9th symphony transcribed for solo piano by Richard Wagner. It's an interesting score.

From what I can recall, it was begun in 1830 (17-year old Wagner) and submitted for publication, but I don't believe it was actually published until 1989 as part of a Complete Works of Wagner collection in Germany.

I can't find any mention of it being performed or recorded, has anyone else heard of either?

If you've seen Schirmer's reprints of Singer's solo piano arrangements of the Beethoven symphonies, Wagner's is similar in texture to those, though usually thinner than Singer's. For the 4th movement, Wagner does not usually assimilate the vocal parts into his arrangement, but instead has them printed above the piano score. Occasionally you'll see the vocal parts in the piano score when there are no other instruments playing, or what appears to be the vocal line is actually still just an arrangement of the orchestra part, when an instrument is doubling the vocal lines.

I don't know if it would be worth the trouble to learn this arrangement, considering the 4th movement may leave a listener a little dry without the parts for voice. But it's still an interesting read, showing which lines Wagner gave importance to, and his (limited) understanding of creating textures and sounds from a solo piano.

EDIT:
The cover of this book features Wagner's handwritten score, part of the first mvt of his trancsription of the 9th
https://www.amazon.com/gp/reader/0521342015/ref=sib_dp_pt/102-0737537-9981720#reader-link

[thalbergmad]

If you are going to learn a transcription of Beethoven 9, i would not learn this one.

Whilst i have not conducted an in depth study, i have seen transcriptions by Pozzoli, Horn, Czerny, Savant, Moscheles, Winkler, Berthold Tours, Goetschius, Kalkbrenner, Wagner & Singer.

I have never seen anything that comes anywhere near the Liszt.

Only my opinion and i might have missed some excellence in the others.

Thal

[liszt1022]

What do you think of Katsaris' "additions" to Liszt?
I move for a veto and full reinstatement of Liszt's text. The subbass notes (I believe these are the "extra" bass notes on the biggie Bosie?) JUST DON'T SOUND GOOD, and they're very distracting. However, his "bonus material" in the Allegro energico does come off pretty well.

And... Scherbakov - same section (Allegro energico) ... why is this played at half speed? Do any orchestral recordings go this slow?

[ksnmohan]

Beethoven's 9th for SOLO piano was perhaps a joke! Even Liszt, who had first written a transcription of the 4th movement for 2 PIANOS, had to admit that it sounded nowhere near the original music. As in the orchestral pieces played on multiple (upto 10!) pianos at the 10th Verbier Piano Festival, Beethoven's Symphonies need atleat 4 if not 6 pianos being played simultaneously.

Prof Narayanan
Madras, India

[thalbergmad]

Indeed sir, one piano is totally inadequate.

Thal

[dnephi]

The Liszt 9th symphony transcription is one of the greatest transcriptions ever made.

[ramseytheii]

I don't think Liszt hesitated at all to say it was impossible to transcribe the 4th mvmt of the 9th symphony.  But hell, he tried anyways!  An interesting bit from Alan Walker:

============================
It was in the chorale finale of the Ninth Symphony, however, that even Franz Liszt went down in defeat.  His work ground to a halt at the very point where Schiller's verses address mankind in transfixing language: "Be embraced, ye millions!  Far from embracing the millions, Liszt's attmpets to telescope both chorus and orchestra into two hands did not get beyond his cell in the Madonna del Rosario.  One look at the score will tell us why.  He wrote to Breitkopf, who had naturally expected to publish all nine symphonies complete, asking to be excused from the task of transcribing the finale: 'After various endeavors one way and another, I became inevitably and distinctly convinced of the impossibility of making any pianoforte arrangement of the fourth movement for two hands that could in any way be even approximately effective or satisfactory."  He went on to ask Breitkopf to consider his work of transcription finished with the conclusion of the third movement of the Ninth.  Breitkopf refused to be brushed aside, however, doubtless haunted by the specter of certain financial ruin if, instead of the nine "complete" symphonies, he were to publish eight and three-quarters of them.  So Liszt reluctantly returned to the task...
==========================

He then gives a fascinating comparison of the opening of the 4th movement: first in Kalkbrenner's arrangement, and then in Liszt's.  One would think that transcription is just writing the notes from the orchestra into two staves, but there is the difference between night and day with these two examples.  I wish I could post them.  Well, if you want to see the Kaklbrenner, I am sure thalbergmad has it.

Incidentally, wasn't it Louis Lortie who played Liszt's transcription of the 9th in New York recently, with a chorus on hand to perform the final movement?

Walter Ramsey

[thalbergmad]

Here is the said Kalkbrenner, just in case anyone is mildly interested.

Thal