Holly Jordan, age 14, of McAllen, Texas, for her question:
HOW MANY PIECES DID FRANZ LISZT COMPOSE?
Franz Liszt, the Hungarian born pianist and composer, was one of the most important composers of the 19th century. He turned out more than 350 compositions, taught more than 400 pupils and collaborated on eight volumes of prose, not counting correspondence.
Liszt was also the originator of the solo piano recital. Music experts say that he was.perhaps the greatest pianist of all time.
Born on October 22, 1811 in a village near Sopron, Liszt began studying the piano at a very early age, first with his father and then in Vienna with a well known Austrian pianist named Carl Czerny. In Vienna he also studied music theory with the Italian composer Antonio Salieri.
In 1823, when he was 12 years old, Liszt moved with his parents to Paris where he soon established himself as a fine pianist. Meanwhile, he took composition lessons from the Italian opera composer Ferdinando Paer and the Czech French composer and theorist Antoine Reicha.
Liszt lived in Paris for 12 years and got to know many of the city's luminaries, including the Polish French composer Frederic Chopin and the French novelist and poet Victor Hugo.
For the next 10 years Liszt toured Europe from Lisbon to Moscow to Dublin to Istanbul. Idolized everywhere, his fame surpassed even that of Paganini. But then in 1847, at the age of 36, he abandoned his career as a virtuoso and rarely played in public again.
As is shown by his own compositions, Liszt was one of the 19th century's harmonic innovators, especially in his use of complex, chromatic chords. He was an innovator also with respect to form, especially in his technique of producing many themes from one.
Liszt's compositions for the piano inaugurated a revolutionary, difficult playing technique that gave the piano an unprecedented variety of textures and sonorities.
Liszt was a man of noble aspirations, good will, humility and generosity.
Among Liszt's well known works for the piano are the Sonata in B Minor, the Transcendental Etudes, the Hungarian Rhapsodies and the character pieces making up the three volume "Years of Pilgrimage." Some of these last, representing nature scenes, anticipate the impressionism of the French composer Claude Debussy.
The orchestral works include the "Faust" and "Dante" symphonies and 13 examples of the symphonic poem, a genre that Liszt invented. "Los Preludes," the best known, is based on a poem of the French poet Alphonse de Lamartine.
Although the ultimate value of Liszt's large output remains uncertain, its originality is unquestioned. In harmony and form his work foreshadows the music not only of Debussy but of such 20th century composers as the Hungarian Bela Bartok and the Austrian Arnold Schoenberg.
Liszt's daughter, Cosima, married the German composer Richard Wagner.
Liszt died in Germany on July 31, 1886,shortly before his 75th birthday.