Aleksander Michałowski (1851-1938): Liszt - Soirée de Vienne

Polish-born Aleksander Michałowski was one of the oldest pianists to record. He was taught by Ignaz Moscheles (Beethoven disciple and friend of Mendelssohn and Chopin) and Carl Reinecke, followed by Carl Tausig (Liszt's greatest pupil). He later also sought advice on Chopin interpretation from Chopin's pupil Mikuli, and also from Liszt, who enthusiastically endorsed his performance of Chopin. He spent most his life as a teacher in Warsaw, with several distinguished pupils.

His early recordings are the best performances, despite the primitive sound quality. This is Liszt's Soirée de Vienne no.6 (based on works by Schubert). The recording was made in 1905

Category:

Music

Tags:

• Aleksander
• Michałowski
• piano
• recording
• classical
• liszt
• Soirée
• de
• Vienne
• no.6
• schubert

[pianopera]

At 1:27, just after the coupure, I can't believe my ears! Tremendous passion, colour and incredible brilliance! Horowitz is no longer my favourite in this piece...

[d60944]

Yes, the control over the two distinctly seperate voices in the right hand is quite astonishing!

[smithsherman]

What a liberation to hear how flexible,

individuated,& complex is the rhythmic handling of performance in old recordings like this.Bravo for your posting!

[gerardbedecarter]

Thanks for uploading this!

[aardvaark069]

These old guys played with incredible directness coupled with great imagination and subtleness. The moderns should learn from them about being direct without being a souless machine. The pedal applications here should be studied closely.

[morvensky]

This is fantastic, but a shame he had to omit so many passages.

[CharlyTejeda]

Zarpadoooo!!!

[antoinezygfryd]

Extraordinaire interprétation,dommage que la musique soit de l'ordure classique.

[marcxopoco]

Teresa Carreno has the very best interpretation of this pice.

[pianopera]

It seems that also Heinrich Neuhaus had lessons with Michałowski...the man must have had a tremendous influence on pianoplaying in the first decades of the 20th century...

[d60944]

And also the teacher of Sofronitsky... (who I rate higher than almost every oher pianist of his generation!)

[pianopera]

Thank you Smith, but I think that I appreciate this performance in a completely different way than you. I know every note of this piece, it can't "unpredictable" for me in the way you hear it.

What I do admire besides the things I mentioned here is his ability to play this in a true "Walz"-like Viennese way by a very subtle rubato on the second beat.

It is also very interesting that this forgotten great pianist was the teacher of Landowska and Levitzky.