Franz Liszt Biography

Franz Liszt is a composer who you either like him, or you don't. His music is categorized in the Romantic Era and the majority of his music was composed for the piano. He did have several orchestra works, but some of his greatest works was for the piano. His favorite key signature was probably the minor. Franz Liszt, no doubt was a wonderful pianist, who composed fairly difficult piano music. Some of his piano music is fairly musical, and somewhat poetic. Most of his music however, is very showy, and sometimes nothing more than an exercise. His piano music obviously cannot compare to the piano music of Chopin, but there are many Franz Liszt piano pieces that are better than some of Chopin's early piano works.

Franz Liszt developed some techniques from Chopin. Although you can hear some similarities between Liszt and Chopin, they are still two completely different composers, with a different skill set, and Franz Liszt did develop his own technique which stands out. His music sometimes goes beyond depression, and can be downright scary at times. Franz Liszt wrote some relentless musical pieces, carrying much suspense. He also liked to write insanely fast piano passages, with tons of chords, probably expecting the piano player to bang away at the piano. Variations of Mozarts La ci darem la Mano is a perfect example of this. Compare Franz Liszt's variation of Mozarts La ci darem la Mano with Chopin's version, and there is one obvious thing that stands out. Chopin's version is playable, musical, delicate, and poetic. Franz Liszt's version is very hard to play, uses too many octaves and huge chords, non poetic like, non musical, and non delicate. My point is, Franz Liszt was obviously more concerned with volume, speed, and piano exercises when he wrote the majority of his piano music. Chopin was obviously concerned with playability and musicality. Both had different agendas as a composer, and this simple comparison that everyone can see makes it obvious.

Franz Liszt did compose some great piano music nonetheless. For example, his piano sonata in B minor is probably one of his best compositions. This piece I fully enjoy, and would even consider studying because it has great musical elements. For example, I like how Franz Liszt starts the piece with a nice introduction, and the theme that he uses is actually a very catching tune. He uses that theme throughout his whole sonata, and Franz Liszt carefully composes beautiful variations, and secondary themes to further enforce his main theme. Franz Liszt shows off very little in this piece, which makes this sonata very musical and worth listening to. This piano sonata is by far greater than some of Chopin's earlier works, such his first piano sonata that he composed.

Franz Liszt also was known for his Hungarian Rhapsodies. Some cartoons even use his music, because it is comical sounding. While it is obvious that Franz Liszt likes to use octaves and big chords, he also is fond of arpeggios, like Chopin. These arpeggios give the music of Franz Liszt a delicate sound, which you sometimes need after a huge volume piano banging moment. Every composer has his positives and negatives, and the positives of Franz Liszt stand out more than his negatives, which justifies him for being one of the greats.