The Piano Recital Is Born
In 1840 Liszt filled a whole evening alone at the piano, and the recital took its name.
Related
Time and place
London, 1840, at the Hanover Square Rooms. Liszt carried an entire evening alone instead of sharing a mixed programme, and the word recital spread from concerts of this kind.
What happened
Concerts had usually been mixed bills, with a symphony, an aria, chamber music and a concerto in turn, the piano only one item among them. Liszt gave the whole evening to one instrument, played from memory, and arranged opera fantasies, his own transcriptions and original works into a single line. He turned his profile to the audience so they could watch his hands. His European tours of 1839 to 1847 carried the format from city to city and produced a fan-like public.
What changed
The soloist became the event, and the piano became an instrument able to hold an evening by itself. Playing from memory moved from exception to norm, programmes were designed around a performer, and agents, tours and stardom took shape. It also made interpretation a question: the same piece could receive different answers from different players.
Listen to the turn
Begin with the Réminiscences de Don Juan, where Liszt turns Mozart's opera into display and song; then the Réminiscences de Norma, with Bellini's melody loaded with octaves and trills; finally the Sonata in B minor, a work of 1853 that proves one piano can carry thirty minutes without a break.
Related
This turn belongs to Romantic; see Bravura, Piano and Character Piece.
Listen in the library
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Sources
- Alan Walker, Franz Liszt — The Virtuoso Years 1811–1847 (Knopf, 1983)，用于核对1840年独奏会与巡演曲目
- Grove Music Online 的 Recital 条目，用于核对 recital 一词在伦敦的用法
Used for fact-checking only; all prose is original.