Line #24 Music/FranzLiszt


1	[[quoteright:290:https://static.tvtropes.org/pmwiki/pub/images/franz_liszt_by_pierre_petit.jpeg]]
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3	Before there was [[Music/TheBeatles Beatlemania]], there was Film/{{Lisztomania}}. The Hungarian composer and pianist Franz Liszt (22 October 1811 – 31 July 1886) was the TropeCodifier for all music stars that came after him. (The violinist Niccolo Paganini was the UrExample, for anyone interested.)
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5	As a child prodigy, Liszt was stage-managed by his father Adam (who played cello in the Esterházy family's orchestra under the baton of Music/JosephHaydn, and through whom the teenage Liszt met Music/LudwigVanBeethoven and Music/FranzSchubert at least once each), until he dropped dead in 1827. Liszt entered a self-imposed exile until the 1830s. After coming out of seclusion, he toured for nine years in Europe, and soon accrued a devoted fanbase comparable to that of today's pop stars.
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7	When Liszt got tired of touring, he settled in Weimar, where he first met that young hotshot composer Music/RichardWagner. They were musical kindred spirits, with a flair for the dramatic. Liszt actually premiered several of Wagner's operas. A number of Liszt's musical themes turned up in Wagner's work (we ''assume'' by permission?!). In 1870, Wagner married Liszt's daughter, Cosima. After 15 years in Weimar, Liszt moved to Rome. Though Liszt was known as a womanizer, he was a practicing Roman Catholic; nevertheless, his decision to become a priest (well, a monk, actually -- a Franciscan Third Order Secular[[note]]St. Francis created the Third Order or "Tertiary" for men and women who were married or couldn't for other reasons [[TakingTheVeil join a monastic community]] but wanted to devote themselves to a holy life[[/note]]) shocked everyone.
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9	After he took up the cloth, Liszt spent the remaining years of his life teaching in Rome, Weimar, and Budapest (which must have been quite the commute). Liszt died of pneumonia in 1886, in Bayreuth (where he did ''not'' want to be, and said so many times) during the big Wagner Festival; without having his Last Rites, with his request to be buried simply in a monk's robe[[note]]actually, the Tertiaries don't wear robes[[/note]] ignored.
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11	Liszt is the composer of the ''Hungarian Rhapsody No. 2'', immortalized in the cartoon shorts "WesternAnimation/TheCatConcerto" and "WesternAnimation/RhapsodyRabbit" as ''the'' definitive concert piano music in Western animation.
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15	!!Liszt in fiction:
16	* He is mentioned as being dead in the song "Decomposing Composers" by Creator/MichaelPalin sang on Creator/MontyPython's ''Audioplay/MontyPythonsContractualObligationAlbum''.
17	* The ''WebComic/HarkAVagrant'' comic "[[http://www.harkavagrant.com/index.php?id=302 Chopin and Liszt]]" focuses on the friendly rivalry Liszt had with Chopin.
18	-->'''Chopin:''' Unrelated, we are both on the cover of ''Enormous Ego'' this week.
19	-->'''Liszt:''' Only this week?
20	* In '' The Website/SCPFoundation'' lore Lisztomania was once considered an SCP.
21	* In ''Film/PhantomOfTheOpera1943'', Liszt appears portrayed by Fritz Lieber Sr. He first appears as a music critic being shown's Claudin's concerto and later plays it at the Paris Opera.
22	* Liszt has been portrayed in several movies, most notably by [[Music/TheWho Roger Daltrey]] in ''Film/{{Lisztomania}}'' and Creator/JulianSands in ''Film/{{Impromptu}}''. His affair with dancer/courtesan Lola Montez is dramatized in Max Ophuls' film ''Film/LolaMontes''.
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24	!!Tropes Present in Liszt's life and work:
25	* TheAce: Liszt was considered the best piano player in history by his contemporaries.
26	* AlwaysSomeoneBetter: Franz Liszt himself considered Music/CharlesValentinAlkan the best pianist of his time.
27	* BadassArmfold: He loved posing as such in portraits of him as [[http://i.imgur.com/F0waYDi.jpg a young]] [[http://i.imgur.com/pgCvWDX.jpg man]].
28	* TheCasanova: He was a notorious ladies' man and had the active sex life to prove it.
29	* DarkerAndEdgier: His late work anticipated atonal music and was considerably darker in tone.
30	* DeadpanSnarker: At yet another person's (false) claim to be his illegitimate offspring, Liszt said, "I know his mother only by correspondence, and one cannot arrange that sort of thing by correspondence."
31	* DealWithTheDevil: His contemporaries suspected him to have sold his soul to the devil to demonstrate equal parts virtuosity, originality, and dashing handsomeness.
32	* DirectorsCut: The original ending of his ''Music/FaustSymphony'' was a rather abrupt handful of bars celebrating Faust's apotheosis. A replacement ending instead featured a men's chorus supported by an organ, notably more [[LighterAndSofter tonal and glorious]] than the original ending which implied [[EvilIsCool Mephisto]] to be [[EsotericHappyEnding way more sympathetic]] than he would be in a classic good ending. JustifiedTrope since Liszt became [[HeelFaithTurn a Tertiary Franciscan later in life]].
33	* ElegantClassicalMusician: RealLife example.
34	* EpicRocking: His Sonata in B minor. Performances finish around 30 minutes. It's considered one of the most badass pieces of ClassicalMusic, as well as an original take on the piano sonata that re-imagines the format as a single movement entity.
35	* FriendlyRivalry: With Music/FryderykChopin. Each admired the other's work as a composer, although Chopin was said to be jealous of Liszt's virtuosity as a pianist - and also annoyed at the liberties he took with Chopin's own work when he performed it in public. Their jealousy spilled into their personal lives as well; Liszt was suspicious of the friendship between Chopin and his own romantic partner (and the mother of his illegitimate children), Countess Marie d'Agoult, while Chopin thought there was something going on between Liszt and his own on-off girlfriend, author [[MoustacheDePlume George Sand]].
36	* GriefSong: He wrote ''dark'' works after the death of his son-in-law Music/RichardWagner, dedicating them to him.
37	* GroupieBrigade: He had one of the first. Contemporary reporters dubbed it "Lisztomania," over 120 years before [[Music/TheBeatles Beatlemania]] happened.
38	* MadArtist: Was considered as such in old age, when he abandoned [[{{Scales}} tonality]], [[DarkerAndEdgier wrote harrowingly bleak music]], and thus became the most radical composer at the time.
39	* MentorArchetype: Liszt was one of the most supportive and generous musicians in history. He unselfishly championed music by those he admired, even composers who did not (or could not) reciprocate his help -- the long list of beneficiaries included: Music/JohannSebastianBach, Music/LudwigVanBeethoven, Music/FranzSchubert, Music/FryderykChopin, Music/RobertSchumann, Music/HectorBerlioz, Music/RichardWagner, Music/CamilleSaintSaens, Music/EdvardGrieg, Music/AlexandrBorodin, Music/JoachimRaff, and Music/MikhailGlinka. Liszt did so by performing their music (sometimes in transcriptions he prepared himself) and providing financial backing of publication and performances.
40	* NoEnding: Some of his later works do this, such as "Nuages gris" and the various "La lugubre gondola."
41	* RearrangeTheSong: A good chunk of his work consists of arrangements of other people's work, ranging from transcribing the symphonies of Music/LudwigVanBeethoven to rebuilding the medieval ''[[DeathlyDiesIrae Dies Irae]]'' into a DarkerAndEdgier piano concerto with lots of EpicRocking.
42	* TheRockStar: The TropeCodifier, albeit with ClassicalMusic rather than rock-and-roll.
43	* SelfDeprecation: On the cover page of his then-unpublished piece ''Music/CsardasMacabre'' he wrote, [[WhoWritesThisCrap "May one write or listen to such a thing?"]]
44	* StandardSnippet: His Hungarian Rhapsody No. 2. If someone on screen is shown playing classical piano, odds are good it will be this piece, especially in cartoons.
45	* SurprisinglyGentleSong:
46	** Liebestraum No. 3 is far more gentle than his usual work, partially [[SubvertedTrope subverted]] since it still requires virtuoso piano skills.
47	** ''Nocturne (En Rêve)'' is a very strong example of this as well.
48	* TechnicianVersusPerformer: Liszt was lucky enough to have both, but compared to other pianists of the era, like Chopin, Liszt was a Performer.
49	* TropeCodifier: He codified the symphonic poem, a piece of music that illustrates a non-musical source on a larger scale than the concert overture, building on the [[TropeMaker innovations]] of Music/HectorBerlioz.
50	* UnbuiltTrope: ''Music/{{Totentanz}}'' with its dissonant usage of the ''[[DeathlyDiesIrae Dies Irae]]'' theme, making it sound like actual post-[[Music/IgorStravinsky Stravinsky]] Modern Classical, when it's "only" Liszt's progressive style coupled with Romantic Irony.
51	* UrExample: The shockingly modern ''Music/{{Totentanz}}'' and his atonal experiments towards the end of his life predate Modern Classical.
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Context Music / FranzLiszt