It takes entire life, hours and hours every day without recess to build at least satisfactory technique to even touch a piece of this caliber. It takes months to mature the rich, complex themes and wrap them into one continuous flow around the most intricate technical subtleties. It takes demonic stamina to survive 15 minutes of double-octave chords, endless waves of glissando-like (!) arpeggios, most capricious, unnatural rhythmic groups in sprint speed without a smallest space for a slip and correction. And there you get a few incidental claps. In era when people still were capable to concentrate on one task/act for a quarter of an hour. Not even the era of tik tok millionaires. Hat off to you, Zoltan.
Could you please explain what attracts you to this music? Does this composition have any meaning beyond demonstrating great technique? It doesn't even sound like something to listen to for fun. It doesn't even sound like music.
@@user-gp8ot4xs4f This work is magnificent. It contains so much affected happiness, nostalgia, yet hopeful nostalgia. Some moments are just pure, simple, charming beauty.
Not to sound like a snob, but it takes a higher appreciation of music to love a piece like this. That is not to say anybody can’t enjoy music like this tho. Liszt is often thought of as a someone who was simply a virtuoso who made everything unnecessarily difficult. While that is true for some of his compositions, Norma is truly unbelievable. It is taking essentially an entire orchestra + chorus and putting it through a single instrument. And I think certain parts of this piece are beautiful even if you dont like Liszt (4:10, 6:45, 8:00, 10:41, 13:15, 13:52)
Kocsis Zoltan is our beloved Superman! He really is SUPER HUMAN! It doesn't get any better than this absolutely divine performance, really, it's beyond Genius!! Liszt himself would have been pea-green with envy!
I don't think Liszt would have been envy, as he did not have that attitude. He was supporting and lifting up his contemporaries, musicians, composers, although several times without any appreciation. About technical skills, I guess Liszt could have more of a composing, "improvising" focus on his techniques than a perfectionist "letter to letter" one, but most of what he could be doing was exceptional from spectacularity and sounding. Liszt's skills must have been really extraordinary, if he could take such a piece like Feux Follets and many others as improvisation (of course this latter was not improvised but a rework from Op1 etudes), but I mean he had that very wide skill set taken from the Karl Czerny "school".
Please don't develop opinions about one of the most amazing piano composers in history if you have never even read a single Liszt article. We're talking about someone who was VERY socially active, inspired millions into the future, and gave credit to every individual pianist & composer that shaped him. Even basement dwellers like Alkan are noted by Liszt to have great technique in which he would adopt into his own works. When Chopin died, Liszt went above and beyond to make sure his name would echo through time. Via a eulogy, never ending name drops, and publication of many Chopin works long after his death. Like get real. Liszt was the student of greatness itself. In no world is such a person envious over some young guy in the 1980s performing one of his pieces well. How do you derive the conclusion of Zoltan being a genius, superman, super human, divine, etc-- While comparing it to Liszt, the person who transcribed this to solo piano to begin with...? O.o sit down kid you are another product of societal ignorance.
0:00 Sinfonia 2:18 Introduzione 3:39 Dell'aura tua profetica 7:05 Deh non volerli vittime 7:57 Qual cor tradisti 10:40 Commosso è già 12:12 Guerra guerra 13:55 Mashup between Dell'aura tua profetica and Commosso è già
Notice the year this was made- 1987. And that, ladies and gentlemen, is how the truly great piano wizards played before competition culture deprived piano-playing of any creativity, originality, and oomph. RIP piano. RIP Zoltan Kocsis.
To be fair, competition culture, and this middle-of-the-road/unchallenging/watered-down mainstream style you’re talking about still existed and was widely accepted in 1987 although perhaps the influence and recognition of previous generations (for one thing, Horowitz was still alive) were still looming in the background. It’s like the beginning of terminal cancer, when the illness itself is there, but the symptoms are less prominent. Have to say, Kocsis’s style was very divisive and unconventional even in his prime. Some of his recordings were panned and elicited outrage from establishment journalists and figureheads (like the Chopin Complete Waltzes CD). I think he existed in this weird limbo where he wasn’t a bog-standard, “politically correct” concert pianist like Zimerman but also wasn’t a complete hack/snake-oil salesman who could bamboozle millions that he was a misunderstood genius like Gould or Pogorelich. People didn’t know what to do with him.
@@Kris9kris Regarding the presence of middle-of-the road, watered-down playing, you're probably right- but even competition playing in the 80's and 90's was head and shoulders above what it is today- and I remember it quite vividly. If it had been anything like today's homogenized playing, I probably wouldn't have remembered any of it. As for Zimerman, Gould, and Pogorelich, Zimerman left us some genius and strikingly vivid recordings- the Brahms 2nd concerto, the Grieg concerto, Liszt's Totentanz, Chopin's third ballade, etc., while Pogorelich left us with magnificent recordings such as Ravel's Gaspard, Prokofiev's 6th sonata, Balakirev's Islamey, Chopin mazurkas, and some shorter Brahms pieces, like the B minor rhapsody, etc.; there's probably plenty more of that caliber. Now which young pianists today can pull off such repertoire CONVINCINGLY and with artistic originality??! As for Gould, I often admire him for his intellect rather than his artistic merit, but his Bach and Mozart were unique and second to none. Suffice it to say that it is suspected that he could hear AND UNDERSTAND three or even four conversations simultaneously- which would truly make him a freak of Nature as well- and would explain some things..... :-)) And I have heard the entire Kocsis recording of the waltzes that you mentioned- I'll agree that they're quite un-idiomatic and "un-chopinian" at times, but still, they are played with great gusto. So what if he was unconventional? .....at least he had spirit and personality - and was a hell of a pianist as well.... :-))
@@Kris9kris This is a really interesting summary of Kocsis's appeal (or not). I've just bought the Chopin CD that you mentioned, hoping to be surprised by the interpretations, and I certainly was! I'm happy to hear a great pianist's personality coming through, and Kocsis achieves this - some would say at the expense of the composer's intentions. But Kocsis would have been the last person to ever ride roughshod over a composer's works - quite the opposite. It's sad that he experienced so much unfavourable criticism from fellow musicians, who could have accepted his highly individual style and appreciated his integrity.
There are only a handful of times when I feel like I can fly listening to music. Kocsis summons flight at 10:41. Unparalleled and inimitable performance. His phrasing and voicing are tops for virtuosity.
Kocsis played with his body and soul, it was not only his uniqueness, but his musicality and passion was unequal as in the amount of power and strength. It's sad for a very fine pianist dying young.
BIG BRAVO, Maestro. Such a beautiful rendition of the Liszt masterpiece. Please RIP. Also, fantastic camera work, no silly shots of the hall’s ceilings, the artist’s hair or back. Thanks for sharing 😂🎉❤❤❤
He definitely has impeccable technique, I loved th sound of his trills earlier in the piece and he does take on a flight at the 11 mark. But I do feel he never gave the audience much of a chance to breathe, and he was unsteady in a number of places, where he spontaneously picked up the tempo.
It's only a small hall in Baden-Baden with a capacity of 200-300 spectators, that's why the applause is so big...However, the "peché" of the piano performance art was created here and then, the most perfect Liszt replica of this piece. I am convinced that only a Hungarian artist can perform a Liszt piece authentically. Kocsis, as a 4th-generation Liszt student and descendant, carries Liszt's genes in his genes, which makes a Hungarian pianist's Liszt performance inimitable. They can be called Horovitz, Richter, Rubinstein, etc., but they lack this "plus", everything is written in the sheet music, everything can be perfectly learned, but the inner state of mind required for the performance of the piece formulated by Liszt cannot be described in the sheet music. It either comes from within or it doesn't. That's all...
This live performance by Master Zoltan and Lang Lang's live performance of Don Juan are definitely one of the most epic performances ever existed. Thank you and RIP Kocsis Zoltan.
@@fredericchopin6445 i originally listened to that. i feel this is better(apart from few parts where it sounds better in tozer's performance). i guess choosing b.w. tozer of this depends from person to person. i personally really liked this one. but tozer's is what i listen to since the audio quality is better
Absolutely astounding virtuosity. Now, 35 years later, I'm sure he would create more melodic contour and phrasing in the slower and softer sections. But solid as a rock technically for sure.
Personal timestamps: 11:50 Left hand A-Bb alterntion he plays it an octave lower! I think I'll take that for my own use too, now that a renowned pianist has done it before me. 2:01 impeccable RH trill
@@Felix_Li_En Michele Campanella has become one of my favorite pianists to listen to recently. I’ll check it out, thanks! (I see you everywhere btw lmao)
Sci-Fi piano playing. He was so immense great Zoltan. Unfortunately for this concert we got into an incompetent camera director. Switching the camera continuously and always at the wrong time.
I find the best way to experience music, except opera, is with my eyes shut. Otherwise there are so many distractions. I find that the camera work of almost every videoed performance is so distracting as to be completely unbearable.
Ce qui se passe à partir de 12'12 est l'un des plus grands témoignages pianistiques jamais enregistrés....I-NI-MA-GI-NA-BLE, surhumain....et les spectateurs ne semblent pas réaliser ce à quoi ils viennent d'assister..........!!!!......
@@liebesleid It's the part of the piece that starts at around 12:12. Type "Guerra Guerra Norma" into the RU-vid search bar and you'll get the corresponding part of the opera "Norma" by Bellini upon which it is based. I agree -- it's not actually Liszt's melody, but it's the type of dark motif that certainly could have been written by him.
@@liebesleid Well, in truth, it's not really parts of the piece that have names, but parts of the opera it's based on, which is very common for opera ("El Toreador" in Carmen, for example). And because this is "reminiscenses" on the opera, the part of the piece essentially takes the name of that part of the opera.
@@liebesleid Liszt takes thematic material from certain operas (Norma, Don Giovanni etc) and transcribes it for piano, but also makes it his own. He does have pure piano transcriptions which are brilliant as well, like the Beethoven symphony transcriptikns
I'd just like to know: how have you managed to preserve the audio quality of this recording on RU-vid, what with all the compression, etc.? It obviously was made on tape- and while the audio quality isn't ideal, the piano's shimmering harmonics shine through in a way that never, ever do in today's recordings. I also guess that that piano, by the way, is a Steinway- and a 20 out of 10 in terms of quality 🤯
Greetings good sir, i would like to ask a permission on using perhaps the audio to do with my project perhaps. If you woild allow it, it would be great
@@ms77619 They're not, I assure you. Liszt arpeggios are often more impressive than really difficult. Left hand is barely nothing.The hardest part of the score is around 12:48
@@MrThrond If you think they’re not difficult than why don’t you go ahead and post a video of you playing them? Also note my key phrase ‘for me at least’
ru-vid.com/video/%D0%B2%D0%B8%D0%B4%D0%B5%D0%BE-14JWBeib6-w.html I absolutely agree, and here is an another real hungarian Superman (Cziffra György). Read over his life, you are going to cry! Greating from Hungary!
@@TF2Starlight Are you serious?Zoltan‘s phrasing is much more natural. Cai misses notes, rushes through many sections like there is no tomorrow. He strikes me more as racehorse than a pianist in his interpretation. I like Cai, but I find his interpretation appalling
Már huszadszor hallgatom, de még nem tudom megmondani, hogy mi tetszik benne, csak azt érzem, hogy egyre jobban. Csodálatos, hogy vannak emberek akik annyira szeretik a zenét, hogy egész életük munkájával, alázattal szolgálják. Azt hiszem ezt hallom-látom ki belőle.
