There is more where that came from: Christian Georges Cziffra (Hungarian pronunciation: [ˈɟørɟ ˈt͡sifrɒ]; born Cziffra Krisztián György; 5 November 1921 - 15 January 1994) was a Hungarian-French virtuoso pianist and composer. He is considered to be one of the greatest virtuoso pianists of the twentieth century.[1] Among his teachers was István Thomán, who was a favourite pupil of Franz Liszt.[2] Born in Budapest, he became a French citizen in 1968. Cziffra is known for his recordings of works of Franz Liszt, Frédéric Chopin and Robert Schumann, and also for his technically demanding arrangements or paraphrases of several orchestral works for the piano, including Nikolai Rimsky-Korsakov's Flight of the Bumblebee and Johann Strauss II's The Blue Danube.[2] Cziffra left a sizeable body of recordings. He died in Senlis in 1994 aged 72. Early years[edit] Cziffra was born to a poor Romani family of musicians in Budapest in 1921.[3] In his memoirs Cziffra describes his father, a player of the cimbalom, as "a cabaret artist". His parents had lived in Paris before World War I, when they were expelled as enemy aliens.[4] His earliest exposure to the piano came from watching his elder sister Yolande practice. She had decided she was going to learn the piano after finding a job which allowed her to save the required amount of money for buying an upright piano. Cziffra, who was weak as a child, often watched his sister practice, and mimicked her. He learned without sheet music, instead repeating and improvising over tunes sung by his parents.[5] Later he earned money as a child improvising on popular music at a local circus.[3] In 1930 Cziffra began to study at the Franz Liszt Academy under the tuition of Ernő Dohnányi until 1941, when he was conscripted into the Hungarian Army. He gave numerous concerts in Hungary, Scandinavia and the Netherlands.[3] Later years[edit] Hungary was allied with the Axis during the Second World War. Cziffra had just married his wife Soleilka, who was pregnant when he entered military training. His unit was sent to the Russian front; however he was captured by Russian partisans and held as a prisoner of war. After the war, he earned a living playing in Budapest bars and clubs,[3][6] touring with a European jazz band from 1947 to 1950 and earning recognition as a superb jazz pianist and virtuoso.[7][8] After attempting to escape Hungary in 1950, Cziffra was again imprisoned and subject to hard labour in the period 1950-1953. In 1956, he successfully escaped with his wife and son to Vienna, where he was warmly received. His successful Paris debut the following year preceded his London debut at the Royal Festival Hall playing Liszt's first piano concerto and Hungarian Fantasy which was also well received.[3] His career continued with concerts throughout Europe and debuts at the Ravinia Festival (Grieg and Liszt concertos with Carl Schuricht) and Carnegie Hall, New York with Thomas Schippers. Cziffra frequently performed with a large leather wristband to support the ligaments of his wrist, which were damaged after he was forced to carry 130 pounds of concrete up six flights of stairs during his two years in a labor camp.[2] In Cannons and Flowers, his autobiography, which has been described as "a hallucinatory journey through privation, acclaim, hostility and personal tragedy", Cziffra recounts his life story up until 1977. In 1966, he founded the Festival de musique de La Chaise-Dieu in the Auvergne, whose pipe organ restoration he sponsored, and three years later he inaugurated a piano competition bearing his own name in Versailles.[3] In 1968 he took French citizenship and adapted his hitherto-Hungarian forenames to the French language. In 1977 he founded the Cziffra Foundation, situated in the Saint Frambourg chapel in Senlis, Oise. Cziffra bought and restored the building, with the aim of helping young musicians at the outset of their careers.[6] Cziffra's son, György Cziffra Jr., was a professional conductor and participated in several concerts and recordings with his father. However, his promising career was cut short by his death in an apartment fire in 1981.[6] Cziffra never again performed or recorded with an orchestra, and some critics have commented that the severe emotional blow affected his playing quality. Cziffra died in Longpont-sur-Orge, Essonne, France, aged 72, from a heart attack[9] resulting from a series of complications from lung cancer.[10] He is buried next to his son.
@@yoyogie69 Wikipedia is a free, open content online encyclopedia created through the collaborative effort of a community of users known as Wikipedians. Anyone registered on the site can create an article for publication; registration is not required to edit articles.
It was born out of an improvisation. All of these notes have been practiced many times in the same order with the exception of only a few. After Cziffra improvised around on a section of the music enough, he ended up playing the same notes each time. After that, he practiced them so they would be committed to memory and possibly over time he improved the composition until he eventually made this recording.
@@michaelharvey702 Yeah it becomes difficult to completely improvise something after you've improvised on it before. Take Art Tatum's tea for two, it took him well over a decade to change and improve how he improvised on it, and he was perhaps the greatest improviser in history.
It is a sensational performance. As someone wrote a few years ago - "I couldn't even play the coda." A great test is playing 5ths or 6ths fast and Cziffra passes worryingly well - inhuman speed!!
I wonder if any other pianist has played or rather, attempted to play this improvisation other than the maestro himself. Incredible playing and amazing that anyone could write it down from Cziffra's recording.
www.allmusic.com/album/release/transcriptions-pour-piano-de-georges-cziffra-mr0002850385 This pianist played this piece, but I never have a chance to listen to this recording
Jacob Simonson yup. He would be given a theme to improvise on and he did something similar to this. He liked having fun with the theme and so he made his improvisation into a piece. Probably the hardest piece to have ever existed in the history of piano.
I get a headache just thinking about trying to play even one bar of this. It's a bit like stumbling across alien technology that's years ahead of our own. I think it was Gyorgy Sandor who had a story about hearing a piano being played next door and it was obviously a four-hand piece, but when he asked who was playing he was told it was just Cziffra and he didn't believe it until he saw for himself.
If someone sight read this piece they would genuinely be the greatest pianist in history; Cziffra’s skills plus AI level sight reading ability? They would never had to practice anything if they had the sheet music.
@@bigdick3228 I pretty much agree, but it also depends on the keyboard. Some heavy actions make upward reliable octave glissandi impossible regardless of hand size or technique. Same thing with 3rds/4ths glissandi.
I'd be interested how people judge between a virtuoso who plays really hard pieces brilliantly or someone who extracts all the feeling out of a piece, and can a virtuoso play with feeling? Cziffra is manifestly a virtuoso. The section of the William Tell I am listening to at this moment is of melting tenderness so perhaps that answers the question.
@@Damian_Theodoridis definitely NOT. I am a pianist of 17 years and This is MUCH harder. Of course, the sheet music here is all computer-generated, but even listening to it is much more difficult. Even things like Cziffras Sabre dance can be more complicated than Islamey. things harder than this would be like...hmmm...Let's say Totentanz, Gaspard (same difficulty most likely), Pettruschka piano...
Following the text while Cziffra is playing his own transcription is fascinating. You realise how technically challenging the piece really is. No wonder nobody else plays it or records it! I have the score and there seem to be misprints although being an improvisation Cziffra would vary the text each time he played it.
Actually Sabre Dance might be even more formidable - but let's get one thing straight - it's Cziffra all the way. He is an Everest amongst many Mt Logans
I cannot believe that this music comes from a human's TWO hands! Make yourself smile when you think that many of today's "artists" think thay are in the same league as this performer...
Did Cziffra notate his own transcriptions? What is up with all the random minor seconds? I know they fit into the hand alright, but seem completely extraneous--as if transcribed after-the-fact.
i think they transcribed it intentionally wrong, so that no one would attempt to play these pieces. i don't think anybody would be up for the job to transcribe these pieces again, correctly, so that is what we are left with. On the other hand i think nobody should attempt to play this. If someone wants to sit with Cziffra and Liszt, they should better write their own versions, and not just copy and learn what somebody else already played.
@@gaborcsordas not really, it's just sloppy transcription. Cziffra's Sabre Dance had an infamously bad transcription, but there's a sheet music video on RU-vid with a much cleaner and better version used
I haven't listened to this for a while but :O:O:O:O:O:O:O:O:O:O rings truer than ever. My favorite bit is 5.06 - 5.09 but the whole thing is a scandalous talent. I don't think a piano has ever lived through something more mercilous from one player.
There are so many interesting hard, hard pieces out there. I've moved on a bit. My current favorites are paul de schlozer etude and grainger ramble on love. I also like Charles Rosen as a piano player.
The sheet music is DEFINITELY very hard, but I don't believe that Cziffra played the notes that are in the score. (at least not in this recording) But then, if someone does want to learn this piece, it seems almost impossible to learn from this particular sheet music. So how would a person learn this piece?
@janvandoedelpuk Were you having a bad day? Even great composers wrote potpourris. And Beethoven himself wrote plenty of variations baaed on silly, but popular, operatic themes. As for a place in history, Cziffra is still listened to by new generations, where wonderful "serious" pianists like Clifford Curzon are all but forgotten. This may be drek, but it's still great fun.
Insane, inhuman technique! To hit all those octaves and chords without a mistake! So easilly played! If Cziffra were alive, he'd be a millionaire with all his perfomances now!
@tomekkobialka I think they only partially edited it, because there still are numerous errors in the sheets, especially in the fast right-hand passages
@C0L050 All you say is correct. The usual virtuoso material was too easy so he had to make some cziffra level material. Apparently the coda at the end is unplayable - let alone the middle bit!!
There is just no getting around the fact that Cziffra was the Pele of Piano. He actually takes a lot of care to play this right. Such a shame this performance was never filmed in HD....I still wonder how it can be real..
And there is a G-flat in the second chord in Finale, but... It must be natural! Maybe he plays the G-flat pianissimo (and it's meant to be played silently)? Just see through his Sabre dance - tons of extra notes are mixed around octaves, and they are always different. The main interval is hit loudly, and the weird abnormal notes are just badly heard. So here is the most probable version. He used a piano recording roll (such as Ampico) and occasionally hit those 'extra' ones? Maybe you agree? =|
I'd like to hear some more performances of his 1838 grand etudes. I don't think they are all here performed on youtube. Some people say Liszt was the greatest pianist ever and I reckon these pieces explain why. Where are they?
His hands are like two research centres. Each more power than the sum of human knowledge. I don't believe there is anyone alive who can play this note for note at the same speed. Any takers?
Look at the second row of music starting 5.41 - one set of chords has 7 notes in the left hand!! It looks like Eb, F, Gb, Ab, Bb, C, Db. Even if that isn't spot-on, how do you play more than 5 notes when they are a mixture of white and black keys? This piece is mad.
If you play Godowsky - chopin etude op.25 no .6 and play well you can play this ~ actually i play Godowsky - chopin etudes fo research or concert can upgrade their skill and help the brain ponder ~
Anyway, the video sounds 1/2 tone higher than what is written, the pastorale sounds in G and not in G flat as in the score and the finale is in E, but written in E flat....
Many truplets ... O_____________________O shit!!!! I cried but her perfomance how he can play 7tuplets 11? 9? 12? shiit this man is god is high high high high difficult play all this Cziffra You are the last True Genius of The music from 20th century You played all the most Difficult composers and you maked new music
I don't understand which method has been used for transcribing the improvvisation, may be some automatic software, seems to be impossible that it has been done "by ear"; what's sure is that what is written is 90% unplayable and not what Cziffra plays....for instance why at the beginning of the Finale there's always a G flat in the left hand?
5:41 is similar to Rachmaninov's 9/Op.39 Etude anyway really brilliant piece, even at points good piece of music. shame that probably nobody will bother playing it..
after 6:00 there were some not completely clean played chords, so it should be a human player. Is this a recording of Cziffra himself, or just another person playing the transscription?
I think the sheet music is from a computer notating program trying to make sense of the recording. This performance is actually an improvisation and Cziffra never bothered to write it down.
As a pianist I don't understand how 5.50 to 5.52 is actually possible. Is an octave glissando possible in one hand?!? Either way, this piece is the closest anyone will ever get to playing Circus Galop. I think Marc Andre would agree.
