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Franz Liszt Quotes

Franz Liszt was a prolific 19th-century Hungarian composer, virtuoso pianist, conductor, music teacher, arranger, organist, philanthropist, author, nationalist and a Franciscan tertiary.

Liszt gained renown in Europe during the early nineteenth century for his prodigious virtuosic skill as a pianist. He was a friend, musical promoter and benefactor to many composers of his time, including Frédéric Chopin, Richard Wagner, Hector Berlioz, Robert Schumann, Camille Saint-Saëns, Edvard Grieg, Ole Bull, Joachim Raff, Mikhail Glinka, and Alexander Borodin.

As a composer, Liszt was one of the most prominent representatives of the New German School . He left behind an extensive and diverse body of work in which he influenced his forward-looking contemporaries and anticipated many 20th-century ideas and trends. Some of his most notable musical contributions were the invention of the symphonic poem, developing the concept of thematic transformation as part of his experiments in musical form, and making radical departures in harmony.

✵ 22. October 1811 – 31. July 1886   •   Other names Franz von Liszt
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Franz Liszt: 7   quotes 17   likes

Famous Franz Liszt Quotes

“Music is the heart of life." She speaks love; "without it, there is no possible good and with it everything is beautiful.”

Franz Liszt

“Sorrowful and great is the artist's destiny.”

Franz Liszt

As quoted in Joseph Machlis, The Enjoyment of Music: An Introduction to Perceptive Listening (1963) Page 107.

“Wasting time is one of the worst faults of the world. Life is so short, every moment is so precious and yet, we live as if life will never end.”

Franz Liszt

As quoted in Alan Walker, Franz Liszt : The Virtuoso Years, 1811-1847 (1987) Page 117.

“Brahms' Variations are better than mine, but mine were written before his.”

Franz Liszt

As quoted in Arthur Friedheim and Alexander Siloti, Remembering Franz Liszt (1961) p. 138.

“The day will come when all nations amidst which the Jews are dwelling will have to raise the question of their wholesale expulsion, a question which will be one of life or death, good health or chronic disease, peaceful existence or perpetual social fever.”

Franz Liszt

Source: As quoted in Col. E. N. Sanctuary’s Are These Things So?, p. 278.

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