Category: Franz Liszt

“Brahms’ Variations are better than mine, but mine were written before his”. The picture is part of the same series taken by the Belgian photographer Julien Ganz in Brussels. Another picture from the same series was posted on May 16 on this group. It was taken in May 1882, in the middle of his usual travels from and to the cities of his “vie trifurquée”: Rome, Budapest, and Weimar.

I have been challenged to use the AI algorithm with drawings and paintings only. The difficulty is to find portraits on which Liszt’s face presents enough elements to be detected…

This post was slightly different from the others. Someone posted this video, called “Rare uncovered audio & footage – Franz Liszt masterclass late 19th century”. It received many comments. Some believed it was true, some not. Of course, this is a fake. I posted a special “story behind” to explain why, based on the group members’ comments. The last video showing the pretended (and fake) recording of Liszt’s masterclass made much noise 🙂 I wanted to propose a special “story behind” for this occasion. I saw some comments that are worth exploring together.

My piano is to me what a ship is to the sailor, what a steed is to the Arab. It is the intimate personal depository of everything that stirred wildly in my brain during the most impassioned days of my youth. It was there that all my wishes, all my dreams, all my joys, and all my sorrows lay. The quote was written by Liszt to his friend Adolphe Pictet, a Swiss linguist, philologist and ethnologist, in Chambéry in September 1837. It was first published by Liszt himself in the French Musical Journal in which he was frequently writing, the Revue et Gazette Musicale de Paris, on February 11, 1838.

Unfortunately it is not with music as with painting and poetry: body and soul are not enough to make it comprehensible; it has to be performed, and very well performed too, to be understood and felt. This is an excerpt of a letter Liszt wrote to his friend the Abbé de Lamennais on April 28, 1845. He was in Marseilles, France, at that time, in the middle of his European touring years. I tried to choose a quote that was written approximately at the same period the picture was taken.

I love you sometimes foolishly and at these moments I do not understand that I could not, would not, and should not be so absorbing a thought for you as you are for me… A few days ago, a picture by the same photographer, Julien Ganz, was posted, also taken when Liszt was visiting Brussels, Belgium. This one was taken later than the previous one, in May 1882.

As the mother teaches her children how to express themselves in their language, so one Gypsy musician teaches the other. They have never shown any need for notation. Another picture of Liszt with his students, but this time by another photographer. This one was taken in 1881 by Julien Ganz in Brussels, Belgium.

Truth is a great flirt. It is taken a bit out of its original context. It can be found in a letter Liszt wrote to Olga von Meyendorff on May 5, 1882, in Brussels. Olga just sent him the text of a speech given at the Académie Française by Joseph Ernest Renan, a French scholar specialized in Semitic languages, civilizations, religion, philosophy, and politics.

Here is the last video of the series of animated Liszt pictures generated with the new AI algorithm. This is the final period, 1876 to 1886. Once again, I added…

I have this famous photo in a book. “Franz Liszt in Weimar”, from Gottschalg’s diary, published 1909. I love this picture. It was taken by Louis Held in 1884 in Weimar for Liszt’s 73rd birthday (October 22, 1884). It represents Liszt surrounded by his students. Here is the complete list.