Liszt Complete Music for Solo Piano 15: Song Transcriptions

These ‘songs without words’, as they might be called, represent a great proportion of the many such transcriptions that Liszt made. Neglecting earlier versions and simplified versions they represent all of Liszt’s works in this genre relating to these seven composers, and are complemented by the numerous transcriptions of Schubert songs, of six Chopin songs, of many of Liszt’s own songs, and of a small number of single songs by various composers from Alyabiev to Wielhorsky, bringing the total to well over 150. Just as with Liszt’s operatic transcriptions, there is quite a range of style and approach, from the literal transcription to the fantasy, but the primary aim seems to have been to make the music available to a wider public—the lieder recital as we know it simply didn’t exist in Liszt’s day. Both for the sake of proselytizing for the songs and for giving a better idea to the pianist about the kind of interpretation required, Liszt almost invariably lays the original song text in the piano score, and is always clear about which musical line belonged originally to the voice.