Liszt Ballade no 2 in B minor - Analysis: A GREEK TRAGEDY 

Great video! Great playing! You explainded it very well. I think there are more plots to be explained. For instance, Hero commited suicide by falling from the tower. That can be represented with the descendent arpeggio at 27:13. At 3:10 i think it represents "Leander arriving at Hero's tower" (There is a beatiful tapestrie with that name). At 3:43 Leander say's "Ich Liebe Dich" and Hero responds in the high register at 04:01 "Ich Liebe dich" just like in Leigh Hunt's poem "‘Leander, I do love you; you can take So brave a journey for a lady's sake". In the third night at 7:28 there is a passage in the poem by Leigh Hunt (1819) that says Leander swimmed victoriously in that night: "The storm began, or not be far from shore; And crying, as she stretched forth in the air, ‘Bless him!’ she turned, and said a tearful prayer, And mounted to the tower, and shook the torch's flare. But he, Leander, almost half across, Threw his blithe locks behind him with a toss, And hailed the light victoriously, secure Of clasping his kind love, so sweet and sure" At 25:50 she ascends to the tower looking for Leander and at 25:56 she saw him death by the shore and runs to him (this is also a plot from the myth). At 26:16 she embraces the death body of Leander by the shore (there a plenty of painting with that moment). She then climbs the tower and commits suicide at 27:13 At 27:54 she ascends to Heaven and at 29:04 she finally meets Leander in Heaven for eternity, they were embraced in a lover's tomb (that is also the end of the myth) and maybe that is why Liszt rejected the first ending in the first edition. Nevertheless you are spot on in the plot explaining very well the myth and Leander's night swimming towards Hero. One question, what edition are you playing at 15:40? Shouldn't it be octaves in both hands in the chromatic part? Its missing the upper voice in the right hand.

16:27 I'd say the moral of the story is, "Don't be a simp." 🤣🤣

Great video. You have a really natural presenting style. Looking forward to more!

My favourite liszt piece, literally a full story and you're telling it perfectly :)

Please don’t stop making videos!

Dear Henrik! Thank you for this wonderful video. You are not only a great player but also a great communicator. What you said about the coda is so esscential . It is a very important point that Liszt rejected the bombastic coda . He didn’t want it to be printed in the first edition, so it have not to be considered as an “Ossia” as a few pianists unfortunately have done in later years. I just now have a dispute with another you tube commentator about the so called “Original “ ending.

Thank you, Henrik, for this amazing analysis of Ballade No.2; it is one of my favorite works by Liszt, my all-time favorite composer. I love reading analyses of Liszt's works and your video is a joy to watch. I hope you keep these coming. I love the complexity of Liszt's works. More of this. I subscribed and activated notifications for your channel.

Insightful narration and nice piano playing. You really manage to make us all very excited about the piece, and i can imagine this presentation appeals to amateurs and professionaks alike. I will be looking forward to watchung other videos of yours in the future!

Liszt is like Beethoven and Chopin combined. I love his works. His themes have a melodic grace very similar to that found in Chopin and in a lot of his works I will hear chords or arpeggios in the bass(or even chords forming an arpeggio) like I generally do in Chopin's works. At the same time however, the power of the notes and the sometimes unconventional harmonies remind me of my favorite composer of all time, Ludwig van Beethoven(whom I consider to be king when it comes to motivic development(I mean developing 4 notes into an entire symphony is incredible)). Bombastic, energetic, extreme dynamics, relatively long pieces with a lot of drama, those are all characteristic of both Beethoven and Liszt. But the melodies within the chords are so Chopinesque feeling in their grace.

wow, im absolutely amazed by your storytelling. this is honestly some very good work.

Fantastic vídeo! This piece is new for me, and is so lovely both music and narrative ❤ Please, don’t stop, you are the best professor👏👏👏

Fantastico chi è quello seduto lì a rendersi partecipe all’esecuzione -lezione .Liszt uno dei compositori preferiti.Sentiti complimenti per aver messo in risalto con tanta competenza,le armonie i cromatismi ecc.

Wonderful analysis and performance! Bravo !, thank you great videos 👍👍👍

Henrik, thank you for this brilliant brilliant analysis and storytelling. It actually came with the other ending when the first time I listened to this piece (weird right?), and I used to love that more for a while even after I listened to this standard ending. Somehow I felt there's something that doesn't make much sense in the other ending afterward until today you solved my myth. Indeed this standard ending is much more logically given the storyline. Thank you again for this great video and looking forward to seeing more.

Your love for music is refreshing to see, plus you're a real master of your art and a very good speaker. The emoji are just perfect too lol! God bless

This is so amazing and beautiful! Very nice story :)

Magnificent video! The story really fits well with the music : D

Lovely playing and analysis. A wonderful video for a wonderful piece. I thought the first ending was absolutely brilliant. It was more heroic than bombastic in my opinion, and the second ending coming after the first ending would've made it perfect

Très belle vidéo, bravo.

Your video deserves a well-tuned piano! But I still like it.

Schumann's "In der Nacht" from his Fantasiestücke, Op. 12 also depicts the Hero and Leander tragedy. How about an analysis video of that piece?

Love the channel! Would you ever be opposed to analyzing one of Liszt's transcriptions? That could be a way to analyze a symphonic work while still keeping this as a channel that analyzes piano works. Just a thought. Keep it up!

I have a hard enough time stretching my hands out to a ninth, and I definitely can't reach a tenth. It is easy enough to just shrink the chord containing a tenth to an octave in span when it is Beethoven that I am playing(either originally composed for piano or arranged for piano solo) because that shrinkage to an octave doesn't ruin Beethoven at all. With Liszt however(the only piece by him I have seriously thought of learning is his Liebestraum), those tenths are important for the piece. When the tenths are in arpeggios, I can play it as written. But when the tenths are in chords, I just can't play the chords as written because my handspan limits me to ninths(which are uncomfortable for me, my largest comfortable interval is an octave) So, when I come across a chord spanning a tenth in a piece by Liszt, do you have any suggestions as to what to do when I practice that piece, given my limited handspan? Should I arpeggiate those chords unlike how in Beethoven, I can just shrink it down to an octave with no worries?

please make an analysis on Liszt's sonata in b minor

How do you play embellishments so masterfully and fluidly? Would you please be kind enough to share how one should practice crazy long passages?

I like to think of it like Leander makes it to the shore but slowly dies in Hero's arms on the fourth night. the decoration is a tear falling.

woaaaaah 😭

I am curious to hear what is the alternative story behind this piece of music. You mention only the one about Hero and Leander, but what is the other story?

😍👏

0:31 Hi. I have a question. Did the French pianists play the bombastic coda or the peaceful one?

What do you mean by plus 5 chords?

Please Chopin's first ballade! I gotta hear the story behind it!

I think the allegro moderato theme at 21:45 is a transformation of T1 rather than a new theme in its own right

"Oh yeah, It's Swimming time Again." What a Weird sentence but great video

Really good playing of a very hard work. With respect to the narrative interpretation, it is quite fun, but I feel that if Liszt had intended this story, he would have given the work a title or superscription that indicated it, as he did so often elsewhere. In the end, I think this Hero and Leander interpretation is a myth (in two senses), ungrounded in any evidence, and probably both Chopin’s and Liszt’s Ballades do not have any real story behind them - they are just great abstract music.

Sorry, but Liszt isn't on par with Chopin when it comes to ballades. The story you told sounds nothing like the music. Ex: why does swimming sound so ominous? Why isn't the lamp being interpreted as it is a guiding light for Leander? Why the need for Leander's ghost? This music would be far better allowing the listener to use their own imagination. Liszt's first concerto sounds like a far better ballade to me. The story does not fit the music, imo. Liszt penned a lot of music far more worthy of the title "ballade".