# What do YOU think of Saint Saens Piano Concerto No. 1?



## DreamBigKeys (Apr 15, 2018)

Personally I love that concerto. I only discovered it yesterday but I’ve known of it’s existance for a while, so that one fateful day when I first listened to it I knew it was a winner, and I was shocked it wasn’t in the standard repertoire. So what do you think? I want to hear fellow opinions on this less popular concerto.

Saint Saens’s second piano concerto is more popular but I’m hooked on the symphonic yet virtuostic piece that is the first.


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## Pugg (Aug 8, 2014)

DreamBigKeys said:


> Personally I love that concerto. I only discovered it yesterday but I've known of it's existance for a while, so that one fateful day when I first listened to it I knew it was a winner, and I was shocked it wasn't in the standard repertoire. So what do you think? I want to hear fellow opinions on this less popular concerto.
> 
> Saint Saens's second piano concerto is more popular but I'm hooked on the symphonic yet virtuostic piece that is the first.


Love them all, my favourite pianists are Pascal Rogé and Jean Phillipe Collard.


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## Trepanian (Jan 7, 2018)

I agree that the first concerto is great (especially the third movement), Romain Descharmes plays this piece phenomenally.


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## Judith (Nov 11, 2015)

Not so familiar with it but after seeing this thread, decided to listen. Very impressed, has some lovely melodies and don't know if I'm right but could hear slight elemwnts of Grieg Piano Concerto in 2nd movement. Might be my imagination though!

Saint Saens on the whole has grown on me recently and becoming my favourite French composer.


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## Enthusiast (Mar 5, 2016)

I'm not the biggest fan of the second rank ("below" Brahms, Schumann, Beethoven) of Romantic piano concertos but do quite like the piece, as I do Dvorak's concerto. In general I think Saint-Saens was a more interesting composer in his younger days (despite a few later masterpieces) so this one is within my preferred Saint-Saens period. My go to recordings for the Saint-Saens concertos are those by Anna Malikova. I also enjoy Pascal Roge's recordings.


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## DreamBigKeys (Apr 15, 2018)

Seems like this concerto is one of those underrated gems of pieces, based on what thoughts I’ve gotten from you.

I wonder if anyone’s performed this piece live


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## Trepanian (Jan 7, 2018)

Enthusiast said:


> I'm not the biggest fan of the second rank ("below" Brahms, Schumann, Beethoven) of Romantic piano concertos but do quite like the piece, as I do Dvorak's concerto. In general I think Saint-Saens was a more interesting composer in his younger days (despite a few later masterpieces) so this one is within my preferred Saint-Saens period. My go to recordings for the Saint-Saens concertos are those by Anna Malikova. I also enjoy Pascal Roge's recordings.


I haven't heard Malikova's recordings of the Saint-Saens concertos, I'll listen to a few now.


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## bharbeke (Mar 4, 2013)

Thanks for the recommendations. So far, 2, 5, and 4 are my preferred concertos from Saint-Saens, but I do like the other two.


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## Anankasmo (Jun 23, 2017)

I love the concerto dearly. Imo after the 2nd and 5th the best Saint-Saens concerto. And since i consider the 5th and 2nd as great as Grieg or Rachmaninoff that says a lot.

Love the *Sandering/Malikova* recording but since its not on Youtube have *Roge/Dutoit*:

Gotta love the first movement with the horn motif and those rippling piano arpeggios.






The second movement is so mysterious and unique..... I love it but it already is obvious that S-S was not going to write many slow movements which is a shame since i love the adagio movements the most.






The 3rd movement is great fun and well constructed as is typical of S-S






What strikes me the most is his early mastership. I mean to create a piano concerto which is so well balanced and holds such perfect structural unity as a first try is just wow.


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## kyjo (Jan 1, 2018)

I *adore* this work! I love all the Saint-Saens piano concerti, but the 1st may very well be my favorite. The outer movements contain sparkling passagework and wonderfully memorable melodies, while the second is dark and introspective (rather unusually so for its date of composition, 1858). It's overall just such a joyous, life-affirming work. Roge/Dutoit on Decca and Descharmes/Soustrot on Naxos are both excellent recordings.


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## Ingélou (Feb 10, 2013)

I am a picker-and-chooser in classical music; inasmuch as I specialise or concentrate my listening, it's in baroque or early music. I almost never listen to piano concertos, and rarely to Saint-Saëns. 

But I have just listened to Saint-Saëns' Piano Concerto no. 1 - and I think it's fabulous. Beautiful, plangent and evocative. Thank you for telling me about it. :tiphat:


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## DaveM (Jun 29, 2015)

While very much a Piano Concerto worthy of interest, to me it is more a work of a youthful composer still learning his craft than a mature work. For a prodigy appearing to have promise not unlike Mozart at an early age, it turned out that Saint-Seans took far longer to mature as a composer. This Concerto was composed at age 23 while the far more accomplished and successful PC #2 wasn't composed for another 10 years.


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## Guest (Apr 27, 2018)

I dislike Saint-Saëns and his music intensely since reading about how badly he treated Cesar Franck - who dedicated a work to him and who was completely ignored by the older man. Besides, his piano concertos are sugary and derivative.


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## KenOC (Mar 7, 2011)

Christabel said:


> I dislike Saint-Saëns and his music intensely since reading about how badly he treated Cesar Franck - who dedicated a work to him and who was completely ignored by the older man. Besides, his piano concertos are sugary and derivative.


"It is one's duty to hate with all possible fervor the empty and ugly in art; and I hate Saint-Saëns the composer with a hate that is perfect." -- J. F. Runciman, 1896


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## Anankasmo (Jun 23, 2017)

Actually i think it is a mature work and far superior to any of the early to mid-Mozart piano concertos or either one of the Chopins...
But to each his/her own....
problem with S-S is that his distincive style which he had mastered as early as in his tarantella Op.6 is not easily observable and when one does not know his work it can indeed seem that he has no own style or is derivative. But once you have listened to a fair share of his work i think an own S-S style is easily to be identified. He may not be an innovator as Wagner or Beethoven but his style is as individual as theirs.

Another problem is that while he had quite early found his own style he never changed it in his whole career which spanned almost 80 years.


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## Anankasmo (Jun 23, 2017)

DreamBigKeys said:


> Personally I love that concerto. I only discovered it yesterday but I've known of it's existance for a while, so that one fateful day when I first listened to it I knew it was a winner, and I was shocked it wasn't in the standard repertoire. So what do you think? I want to hear fellow opinions on this less popular concerto.
> 
> Saint Saens's second piano concerto is more popular but I'm hooked on the symphonic yet virtuostic piece that is the first.


If you like the first than you might try the third S-S piano concerto which is seen as his weakest effort in the genre but imo still of a quite high calibre..... It has quite a similiar finale as the first.


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## DaveM (Jun 29, 2015)

Anankasmo said:


> Actually i think it is a mature work and far superior to any of the early to mid-Mozart piano concertos or either one of the Chopins...


I don't think even Saint-Saens himself would have agreed with that.


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## Meyerbeer Smith (Mar 25, 2016)

Christabel said:


> I dislike Saint-Saëns and his music intensely since reading about how badly he treated Cesar Franck - who dedicated a work to him and who was completely ignored by the older man. Besides, his piano concertos are sugary and derivative.


I wouldn't say that I hate him, but he leaves me cold. I've heard nine of his operas. Apart from Henry VIII and parts of Samson, they seem academic. His music doesn't do anything wrong, but it doesn't do anything right either. It's clear, it's correct, but it lacks inspiration and passion. He was a polymath; perhaps his philosophical, scientific mind - an abstract, rational intelligence - wasn't well suited to theatre.


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## Star (May 27, 2017)

Not great music but pleasant listen.


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## Star (May 27, 2017)

Christabel said:


> I dislike Saint-Saëns and his music intensely since reading about how badly he treated Cesar Franck - who dedicated a work to him and who was completely ignored by the older man. Besides, his piano concertos are sugary and derivative.


If we hated every composer who was bad to others we might have a rather long list. Think of Meyerbeer recommending Wagner's Reinzi and then what followed ,


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## BiscuityBoyle (Feb 5, 2018)

DaveM said:


> I don't think even Saint-Saens himself would have agreed with that.


I don't think even Saint-Saens's mom would have agreed with that :lol:


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## Rogerx (Apr 27, 2018)

Pugg said:


> Love them all, my favourite pianists are Pascal Rogé and Jean Phillipe Collard.


Excellent choice, completely agree.


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