# Liszt Concert Etude No. 2



## Guest (Apr 18, 2020)

I've been listening to the Bolet performance of this with score. At *2:47* here (I cannot see any bar numbers) I'm wondering how in the world it's possible to play this with only 2 human hands. Please advise:


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## hammeredklavier (Feb 18, 2018)

You can see in the score, there is a smaller staff with smaller notes (written above the usual two staff-system) that are marked "Ossia". It means you're free to play the passage as the right hand part instead of the "original" right hand part. Jorge Bolet plays the Ossia in the recording.


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## Guest (Apr 18, 2020)

hammeredklavier said:


> You can see in the score, there is a smaller staff with smaller notes (written above the usual two staff-system) that are marked "Ossia". It means you're free to play the passage as the right hand part instead of the "original" right hand part. Jorge Bolet plays the Ossia in the recording.


Thank you; that was indeed the part I was reading in the Bolet. But I still cannot see the point; you can either play as written or, well, why would the composer write 'the original' and then offer an alternative? I don't recall Beethoven doing this.


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## Eusebius12 (Mar 22, 2010)

Because Liszt's music was considered 'too difficult' at the time. This is not the only instance of Liszt providing 'ossias'. Also there are so many versions of a goodly number of his piano pieces. An extreme example might be no.3 in that set of concert etudes, known as 'un sospiro'. So many alternative versions especially in the coda (+cadenzas etc).


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## Guest (Apr 18, 2020)

Eusebius12 said:


> Because Liszt's music was considered 'too difficult' at the time. This is not the only instance of Liszt providing 'ossias'. Also there are so many versions of a goodly number of his piano pieces. An extreme example might be no.3 in that set of concert etudes, known as 'un sospiro'. So many alternative versions especially in the coda (+cadenzas etc).


So did Liszt provide these 'ossias' or was this the work of an editor or editors?


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## Eusebius12 (Mar 22, 2010)

Christabel said:


> So did Liszt provide these 'ossias' or was this the work of an editor or editors?


Almost invariably, Liszt himself. Unlike in the Emil von Sauer version of the Brahms piano works, in which numerous ossias are provided by the editor, unnecessarily for the most part. Liszt in any case was constantly revising his own works. The 'un sospiro' is a good example of this.But there are 3 versions of the Paganini etudes and the etudes de concert, as well as different versions for works in the Annees de Pelerinage.


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## hammeredklavier (Feb 18, 2018)

Eusebius12 said:


> Because Liszt's music was considered 'too difficult' at the time. This is not the only instance of Liszt providing 'ossias'. Also there are so many versions of a goodly number of his piano pieces. An extreme example might be no.3 in that set of concert etudes, known as 'un sospiro'. So many alternative versions especially in the coda (+cadenzas etc).


Also, Liszt liked to have many options to passages of original music; he often liked to improvise and add embellishments (in form of arpeggios, thirds, sixths, octaves) to other composers' original music when he played. And it was one of many things Clara Schumann hated about him.


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## millionrainbows (Jun 23, 2012)

Yes, it's amazing, and amazing that it could be written down. Bolet is one of my favorites. I have that RCA session where he was playing unplanned, while the tape was running.
Evgeny Kissin is also an excellent Liszt player.


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