Search - Liszt, Bleicher :: Complete Organ Works

Great sound, but I don't think this is all the organ music.

C. McGovern | Beacon Falls, CT USA | 01/24/2003

(4 out of 5 stars)

"Maybe not a "must-have" for Liszt lovers, but it's a step in the right direction to get you warmed-up for one. Sadly, the CD released on Hungaraton is much more complete (I noticed "Via Crucis" was missing) and a lot pricier than this, but if you can listen to all of this in one setting, you won't be wasting time with that collection either.
Liszt wrote many beautiful and powerful pieces of music for piano, orchestra, piano AND orchestra, and it turns out, some of the most astounding music written for the organ since JS Bach!
Lots of very solemn, religious music (Particularly a Requiem written for his children, who tragically died young, and his parents), and some of the more characteristically fierce compostions ("Prelude & Fugue on B-A-C-H") that practically eclipse his most pyrotechnical piano music (Though Liszt did do a piano reading of the Prelude & Fugue that sounds just as electrifying). A REAL highlight for me is a piece titled "Introitus" with chord changes pushing the envelope far ahead of the 19th Century (Makes you wonder if Brian Wilson or Pete Townshend happened to hear this piece very early on in their lives).
Also of interest are several transcriptions (something Liszt was VERY characteristic of) of other composers--Pieces by Chopin, Mozart, and Wagner (Awesome re-arrangement of "Pilgrim's Chorus" from Tannhauser) among them.
Stefan Bleicher is splendid on this herculean recording (He completed it between Jan and July '98), and he's also done one for Saint-Saens. It'd be nice if he could do Bach's Organ music so we could get cheaper CD sets on Arte Nova (even though he'd probably have to do three times as many 4-disc sets for Bach)!"