Vladimir Horowitz and Franz Liszt: The Piano as Miniature Orchestra

“For me, the piano is the orchestra” - Vladimir Horowitz. What did that mean? Horowitz explained:

"

Some people say, 'A piano is only a piano.' But I do not feel it so. I think forte, and think 'orchestra.' I think of many instruments when I play. I do not mean that one should try to imitate, for the timbre of the piano is not the timbre of the violin nor the bassoon nor the flute. But if one thinks of the quality or the sonority of the various instruments, one is helped to play more beautifully. We have, in the piano, all registers—flute, oboe, violin, viola, clarinet, 'cello, bassoon, double bass. . .

"

Horowitz's hands

He has expressed similar views elsewhere. Here is an excerpt from Anthony Tommasini's 1988 interview (from nytimes) with Horowitz: "When pressed as to whether, looking back on his life, he has any regrets, Mr. Horowitz admits to two. One is that he never played in public Franz Liszt's piano arrangements of the Beethoven symphonies. ''These are the greatest works for the piano, tremendous works. But they are sound works,'' he explains, meaning works that draw on the piano's vast coloristic possibilities. ''For me, the piano is the orchestra. I don't like the sound of piano as a piano. I like to imitate the orchestra - the oboe, the clarinet, the violin, and, of course, the singing voice. Every note of those symphonies is in these Liszt works.' And as for Mr. Horowitz's ability to mimic the orchestra on the piano - 'This is something I have. I played them all the time for myself. But I thought people would not understand this music. We are such snobs. Today, people think to be profound musicians you have to play four or five sonatas in one evening.' "

With this video, I tried to show Horowitz's orchestral understanding of the piano. First I used the orchestral recording, then Horowitz. In the first comparison, Danse macabre, you can hear how Horowitz reproduced the colors and accents of the instruments in the orchestra. In the second comparison, The Stars and Stripes Forever, we can hear Horowitz reflecting the orchestral polyphony on the piano. In the third comparison, Rákóczi March, we hear Horowitz's understanding of orchestral dynamics and his aim to produce a sound as powerful as an orchestra from the piano (Harold Scohenberg: ". . . crashing fortissimos that could ride over the loudest orchestra"). The fourth comparison is Horowitz's special, which I added as a bonus.

The Piano as Miniature Orchestra

Of course, Horowitz was not alone in this thought. Many composers and pianists have established a relationship between piano and orchestra. For example, Vladimir Horowitz argues that Ludwig van Beethoven was like this (I agree with this view): "Beethoven wrote for the piano, but he thought orchestrally. His piano was the means to an end, and his objective was fulness of tone. He heard in the piano the string quartet, the orchestra."

The most famous of those who approached the piano with an orchestra was undoubtedly Franz Liszt, Beethoven's spiritual heir. As one of his pupils exclaimed, “He orchestrates with his fingers.” Liszt said similar things to Horiwitz: “We make broken chords like the harp, long-drawn tones like the wind instruments, staccati and a thousand kinds of passages which formerly it appeared possible to bring forth only from this or that particular instrument.”

In a letter Liszt would say: "By the title of Pianoforte score  I wish to indicate my intention of associating the spirit of the performer with the orchestral effects, and to render apparent, in the narrow limits of the piano, sonorous sounds and different nuances. With this in view I have frequently noted down the names of the instruments: oboe, clarinet, kettle- drums, etc., as well as the contrasts of strings and wind instruments. It would certainly be highly ridiculous to pretend that these designations suffice to transplant the magic of the orchestra to the piano; nevertheless I don't consider them superfluous. Apart from some little use they have as instruction, pianists of some intelligence may make them a help in accentuating and grouping the subjects, bringing out the chief ones, keeping the secondary ones in the background, and--in a word--regulating themselves by the standard of the orchestra."

Franz Liszt

Liszt has many such attempts. Even Hungarian Rhapsodies, Piano Sonata and Mephisto waltzes have orchestral effects. A small excerpt from Camille Saint-Saens's 1893 article entitled "Liszt II" from "Portraits et souvenirs, Société d’edition artistique": "Liszt’s influence on the development of the piano was immense. The only thing I can find comparable is the revolution wrought by Victor Hugo on the workings of the French language. This influence is more powerful than Paganini’s on the violin. . . Most important of all, he has introduced orchestral sonorities and combinations into piano music in as complete a manner as possible. His procedure for achieving this aim—a procedure not within the capabilities of everyone—consists in making his transcriptions free rather than lit- eral versions of the original. Seen and practised in this light, transcription becomes a highly artistic enterprise; Liszt’s adaptations of the Beethoven Symphonies—especially his two-piano transcription of the Ninth—may be regarded as the masterpieces of the genre. . . . The Soirées de Vienne and the Hungarian Rhapsodies, even if their themes are borrowed, are truly original and demonstrate the most refined talent; the Hungarian Rhapsodies can be seen as illustrations for the strange book Liszt wrote on gipsy music. It is quite wrong to regard these merely as showpieces. They offer a complete reconstitution—one might say a 'civilization'— of the music of a race, which is of the greatest artistic interest. The com- poser was not interested in the pianistic difficulties, which didn’t exist for him, but in the picturesque effect and the lively reproduction of the bizarre gipsy orchestra. Come to that, virtuosity is never an end in any of his piano music, but a means. Failure to realize this leads people to go against the meaning of his music and render it unrecognisable."

Liszt actually saw the idea of ​​imitating other sounds on the piano in other composers. Chopin was producing a flawless vocal sound on the piano like never before. As Liszt said, Thalberg was famous for producing harp and violin sounds on the piano. Above all, Paganini imitated sounds such as guitar, harp and bell on the violin. Hector Berlioz and Beethoven had similar sound imitations in their orchestral works. It was on this occasion that Liszt noticed the immense sound color of the piano.

Some great pianists in the 20th century also saw vocals and orchestra on the piano. In Liszt recordings of Moriz Rosenthal, Liszt's pupil, we can see the obvious orchestral accents and colors on the piano. A distinctive imitation of violin and cimbalom is heard on Busoni's recording of Liszt's 13th Hungarian rhapsody. Take a look and compare Rachmaninoff's own arrangement, Mendelssohn Scherzo's playing, to any original orchestral recording of the same piece, and we see a flawless orchestral manner and perception on Rachmaninoff's pianism.  Let's read what Alfred Brendel had to say about Alfred Cortot's orchestral colors: "Hearing Cortot play, you sense the conductor in the multitude of colours that he can produce on the piano - even if Chopin, as I said, was an out-and-out piano composer. There are other piano-playing conductors who play the piano without much colour, merely fluently and evenly. Cortot was an exception. Although he was mainly a pianist, he did conduct a great deal and gave many first performances in Paris. He was highly praised by Debussy as a conductor of Wagner."

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