Playing music in the form and style believed to represent the time and so-called "intentions" of the composer is one ideological position a person can take about performance, but certainly not the only one. Think critically for a moment about just a few of the potential weaknesses inherent in your position. 1) We don't have recordings of Liszt, so don't know, except from second-hand accounts and letters, what he actually did. Furthermore, even if we could hear what he did, we don't know that that is what he would want others to do (even if he went so far as to *say* what he wanted, it might be a lie to protect his own branding as a musical genius). 2) The attempt to place order and rules (are you capable of clearly articulating those rules you mention? it's probably impossible because of the abstract nature of the medium) on performance in an art space highlights the power and status relationship the classical art form has wielded over the years. If one is to attempt to articulate and perform with some set of rules in mind that some critic (who probably didn't make it as a performer himself) uses to evalute a performance (and often, there is no such set of rules -ie the critic is arbitrary), one is therefore constrained from making potential advances in the art form as a result of the inability to build and try new models and approaches to performance. (Incidentally, this conformity is exactly the way that leaders and the highest members of the upper classes try to squelch revolt, change, and to control others, while going ahead with their own ideas, models, and performance modes).
What I do is not "whatever I'd like" -- I could wear a purple hat and saw on the piano whilst throwing change at the strings, but no - I try to conceptualize an idea about what a performance could be (in large part, thinking about what effect it will have cognitively and emotionally, and working backwards), and use the notes and prior performance tapes of Horowitz as "idea points" from which I depart to fit a combination of my model and my personality. In a very real sense, the "work" is not some piece of paper or vision of a composer, rather the recording/performance and idea of what it should be itself becomes and is the "work." In this regard I consider what Horowitz did a "work" because of its recording record even though we are not sure he ever wrote it down or articulated verbally what he wanted it to sound like.
Reread my first post, and you will see exactly what my guiding model is in this particular performance. In part, the controversial response you all are engaging in is indeed part of the "work" by my conception.
On a final note (mostly to Rob47), again, it was a real (bad) piano in front of a real hall (albeit not really a concert hall acoustically) in from of real people (do you need a complete list of names? I will say it included Nobel prize winners and a Baron, Cambridge Masters and members of the Cambridge music faculty), go on vitaminic and listen to the Danse Macabre and Wedding March for audience noise to in part prove this. Have you realized yet that I'm being brutally honest and haven't yet decieved you? I'd appreciate if you'd extend me the basic courtesy of refraining from bashing and calling me a liar without being able to affront any evidence that can justify the claim. Otherwise, you run the risk of making yourself look foolish to the readers rather than actually helping your claims and arguments.
Topic: Hungarian Rhapsody No.2 Liszt/Horowitz/Bennett