Litolff - Concerto Symphonique No.4 - 1. Allegro Con Fuoco. part 2 of 5.wmv

The French critic, composer and pianist Oscar Comettant declared in his book Musique et musiciens of 1862 that the piano and piano playing had become so popular that a separate town should be set aside for pianists. Comettants Pianopolis was based upon the fact that there were twenty thousand piano teachers in Paris alone and that if each had five students there must be at least one hundred thousand pianists residing in the city, approximately one fifth of the total population. In reading the various journals, letters and other documentation of that century, one is impressed by the sheer bulk of literature for the piano published at that time and by the virtually infinite number of people playing the instrument. One of the many pianists captured by this keyboard industry was Henry Charles Litolff, an itinerant concert pianist who visited most of the European countries during his lifetime, composed piano concertos, salon music, chamber music, a few orchestral compositions, and twelve operas, the three earliest of which were written prior to 1860 when he settled in Paris for the rest of his life.

Litolff was born in London on 6 August 1818. His father, Martin Louis Litolff, was an Alsatian dance violinist who had been taken prisoner by the English during the Peninsular War in Spain. He taught the young Henry until the age of twelve. His mother was a Scottish lady, Sophie Hayes. The adverse circumstances of the Litolff family placed the son as a labourer in F W Collards piano factory where he later demonstrated pianos and his practising was so impressive that Collard recommended Litolff to Ignaz Moscheles who taught him until he was seventeen when he eloped. For a time, his wanderings and temporary residencies were the life of a flamboyant concert pianist, teacher and conductor in cities and countries throughout Europe, from Brussels, Berlin, Braunschweig and Warsaw to Paris.

Besides his four marriages, the final one in 1873, he befriended many musicians including the renowned piano teacher at the Paris Conservatoire Pierre-Joseph-Guillaume Zimmermann, the piano builder Jean Henri Pape, the music critic François-Joseph Fétis, composers Hector Berlioz and Franz Liszt, and the Parisian conductor Jules Étienne Pasdeloup. At one point he had a nervous breakdown and lived with the Von Bülow family in Dresden, in exchange for which he taught the young Hans von Bülow.

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• Liszt
• Litolff
• Piano
• Concerto