Transcriptions Presented by Liszt Academy

Throughout history, composers have had a habit of incorporating works and rewriting earlier pieces by fellow artists, switching instrumentalizations, rearranging the harmonies and melodies, indeed, often restructuring the musical form. This concert introduces students of the Doctoral School of the Liszt Academy on the stage of the Sir Georg Solti Chamber Hall. They play famous and lesser-known arrangements on two instruments, the piano and the harp. There are ‘songs’ – orchestral works without vocalists – on two pianos. Ferenc Liszt transcribed for piano songs with Polish lyrics from Chopin, and Clara Schumann, Robert’s wife, who herself was a composer and excellent pianist, arranged her husband’s compositions. When still in his twenties, Zoltán Kocsis made a double-piano version of an early Bartók orchestral work Two Pictures. However, Bartók is presented not only as a ‘source’ but arranger, too: in the 1920s, he rewrote several Baroque keyboard works for piano. On top of all this, the audience is in for a real treat with some transcriptions for harp.