Classical Music for Aficionados

Len    Going back and reading previous posts I had a good laugh about Saint-Saens maybe writing the Liszt Sonata , that was a scream. Did you know that the Saint-Saens Organ Symphony was dedicated as follows" To the memory of a great man Franz Liszt ". When asked who he thought was the greatest sight reader he had ever came across Liszt thought for a moment and said " well if you discount me it would have to be Hans von Bulow and then Camile Saint-Saens ". Very humble man wasn't he ?Another thing about Saint Saens was he was in company with von Bulow and Wagner and he had gotten tired of the other two speaking in German all night so he went over to the piano and looked at what was sitting on it. He opened a score and it happened to be Wagner's latest opera possibly Parsifal and he started playing it through from full score and at this time no one had heard Wagners latest work. The room went quiet and Saint-Saens carried on playing and at the end of the first act there was a howl of surprise and Liszt who had heard it from the adjoining room thought it was Bulow who was every bit as precocious and Liszt was flabbergasted to see it was Saint-Saens. Liszt worked tirelessly for young pianists and composers.

Jim
Yes I have read your story about Saint Saens and Wagner.
Edward Said wrote a slightly different version of this story.
Said says Saint Saens was visiting Wagner at Beyreuth, and that Liszt was also there.  (Wagner's wife Cosima was Liszt's daughter.)  Wagner and Liszt were chatting, Saint Saens sat down at the keyboard where Wagner had left his unfinished score of Siegfried.  And S.S. played a perfect rendition of the score, sight reading it and transposing the orchestral score to piano.
Edw. Said (in case you don't know) was professor at Columbia, most famous for "Orientalism", and before that for revising literary criticism.  He was also a classical pianist, and wrote reviews for NYT and other publications.
Said and Barenboim founded the West Eastern Divan Orchestra, bringing together young Israeli and Arab musicians.

https://books.google.com/books?id=IVp4jNhkffIC&pg=PA279&lpg=PA279&dq=Saint-Sa%C3%ABns+vi...

Cosima was the illegitimate daughter of Lizst and the wife of Bulow before Wagner .Hard to believe but she was even more anti-semetic than Wagner himself and much of the utter vile in Wagners endless anti Jewish articles came from her.She was an early supporter of Hitler and was thrilled to welcome the great man to Beyreuth on his many trips .As I am sure Wagner would have . 

Not a few German Historians draw a straight line from the Wagner's to Adolf .

.



bey

Jeremy, I see where you are coming from here and I know tales can get messed up in the telling. My source is Prof. Alan Walker the official biographer of Liszt who has written three huge volumes on Liszt and his circle .It is probably in volume 2 or 3 and they are huge and I have read them twice and also use them for reference. He writes about all the young pianists and profesional people who came to visit him.

Len    you are spot on about Cosima she was a nasty piece of work, she even left her father on his death bed to go to her beloved Beyreuth and lord it over another of her beloved Richard's diatribes. She even stopped any of his pupils from coming in to tend to him and make his passing a little easier. No out of the three children he had she was definitely the worst and sad thing is she outlived Wagner by nearly forty years.