In
Franz Liszt's bicentennial year, numerous recordings and reissues of his music have appeared as a matter of course, but perhaps none is as unique, intriguing, and instructive as
Pierre-Laurent Aimard's 2011 album,
The Liszt Project, which presents pieces by the Hungarian master with compositions by other composers that bear his influence. Such works as
Liszt's widely emulated Sonata in B minor and some of his highly chromatic, tonally unstable pieces can be shown to have exerted a powerful effect on
Richard Wagner,
Alban Berg, and
Alexander Scriabin, particularly in their piano sonatas. Furthermore, some of the more picturesque and evocative keyboard pieces have shaped the musical ideas and techniques of such modernists as
Béla Bartók,
Maurice Ravel, and
Olivier Messiaen. Divided between two CDs, the program's organization makes clear the points of comparison between
Liszt's pieces and those of others, and any attentive and imaginative listener can make the connections quite easily, if not through any theoretical knowledge then at least through recognition of similar harmonies and sonorities.
Liszt is often cited as a catalyst in his time, having persuaded many of his colleagues and followers to adopt his innovative methods. But
Aimard shows how far-reaching his personality truly was, a force composers reckoned with well into the 20th century. Deutsche Grammophon's reproduction is clean and resonant, and the piano's various tone colors are remarkably well-captured. N.B.: the back cover gives a misleading order of the pieces found on the CDs, but the correct track listing is given in the accompanying booklet.