Andante finale aus der Oper König Alfred, transcription for piano (after Raff), S. 421/1 (LW A183/1)

• Date: 1853
• Composer: Franz Liszt
• Period: Romantic (1820-1869)

Review

Liszt, in full stride through his Glanzzeit, gave a recital in Basel in 1845. About to go on-stage, his secretary informed him that a young man outside the theater had walked from Zürich in the rain to hear him, only to find the house sold out. With his customary generosity, Liszt had the 23-year-old Joachim Raff, soaked to the skin and dripping, seated on the stage. Afterward, Liszt became acquainted with a major talent -- Raff had been a child prodigy, played violin, piano, and organ and composed. Though a recommendation from Mendelssohn had enabled him to have some pieces published by Breitkopf & Härtel, he was eking out a scant living as a critic. As he continued his tour of the Rhineland, Liszt took Raff along, ending at Bonn for a festival in Beethoven's honor, largely funded by Liszt and of which Liszt was -- against nearly insuperable organizational incompetence -- the chief animateur. The glitterati were out in force -- Berlioz, Spohr, Meyerbeer, Moscheles, Jenny Lind -- and Liszt was liberal in introducing his new acquaintance, hoping to establish useful contacts. In the end, the best that could be done was to secure Raff a steady job in a piano warehouse. Liszt and Raff remained in touch. When Liszt abandoned his concert career in 1848 to become kapellmeister to the court of Saxe-Weimar,he had a backlog of worthy causes to espouse, the most pressing being that of Wagner, whose escape to Switzerland after having been a co-conspirator in the 1848 Dresden uprising Liszt facilitated. Liszt brought Raff to Weimar in 1850 to serve as his amanuensis as Liszt mastered orchestration, with Raff making initial orchestrations from Liszt's piano scores, which Liszt tried out with the court orchestra and revised. The practice, spurred by Raff's overweening claim to have orchestrated a number of Liszt's works, led to misunderstandings that persist in the Liszt literature, and to Raff's own disappointment. Meanwhile, Liszt produced Raff's opera König Alfred at Weimar in 1851. Its four performances did not set the Rhine on fire, but that Liszt had interested himself in it lent Raff a certain prestige. In 1853 Liszt published two transcriptions from König Alfred, the obligatory operatic march and the Andante finale, whose languishing, labored, schmaltzy manner, though hardly operatic, possesses a period charm, substantiating Alan Krueck's characterization of Raff's reputation through most of the twentieth century as "silly and...sentimental, a periwinkle tunesmith engendering teardrops at tea time in the salon." ~ Adrian Corleonis, Rovi

Albums with Complete Performances of the Work

Title	Date
Liszt at the Opera, Vol. 4	1996

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