Who iz your favrorit early-romantick pianizt compozer?

[xsdc]

From one thing to another, but I listened to this piece by Urhan earlier this year. I don’t know how typical it is, but I think it says a thing or two both about the man and Liszt’s fascination with him. As you probably know he was deeply dedicated, deeply religious, and deeply ascetic. One of those several personalities at the time who helped fuel something greater than themselves.

[dachoo42]

Just looked through the sheet music for Robert, and wow. It is beastly writing, at first glance perhaps not as hard as Op.76 no.2 but it’s for left hand which makes it more awkward, especially for all those high notes.

I would really like to see a live performance as well because the pianist would surely be hopping around on his seat

[festinfurious]

It’s also relentlessly physical. I’ve played around with it and after a while it really is just too much.

[prokmofo]

Damn, now you got me hooked on reed organs. That channel was brilliant

[xsdc]

I haven’t looked in to it, I think I found it through an Urhan search.

I like that hymn though. Simple piece, but there is a touch of genius in the B section at 03:00.

[prokmofo]

It’s really soul touching music, been listening to this guy for hours now

[88]

If you talk about early Romanticism in German music, you can’t really do without the piano works of C.M. von Weber…

[xsdc]

Soul touching, but also shielded off from the world somehow. When you read about Urhan he comes across as such a peculiar man, but when you hear his music you begin to understand him.

Wikipedia provides →

According to Ernest Legouvé Urhan was both entirely religious and entirely devoted to music. He lived like a medieval ascetic, abstaining from almost everything except his daily visit to the Café des Anglais. His love for theatre music created a severe inner conflict, which he overcame by asking the permission of the Archbishop to play in the orchestra of the Opéra (of which he was Leader), being told it was a matter for his own conscience. He accepted this by always being seated with his back to the stage, so that he never saw the singers or dancers for whom he played, even when providing solo accompaniment for a dancer.

He was in many other ways withdrawn and eccentric. He once visited Legouvé’s wife and sat silently in her house for a time, and only as he left spoke, saying ‘Thank you, I needed to come and see you.’ On another occasion, while walking in the Bois de Boulogne, a voice came into his mind and instructed him to write down a tune. He did so, and published it, but refused to be credited as its author, calling it ‘transcription’, and insisting that Legouvé write an article on the miraculous composition.

However, no-one thought of laughing at him, because he led such an austere life, and gave everything he earned to charity. His dignity, not for himself but for the music he served, was proverbial. When a beautiful young duchess made a slight commotion entering a concert given by the Marquis de Prault at the Faubourg Saint-Honoré, during a Beethoven string ensemble movement led by Urhan, the violinist rapped with his bow to stop the music and waited for total silence before restarting the movement.

Legouvé thought there were several greater violin virtuosi in Paris than Urhan, but that he outshone them through his profound knowledge of the masters and respect for their music, and through the indefinable quality of style which he brought to them. He often differed with Habeneck, when the conductor wanted to make cuts, and actually published and signed an article against Habeneck when he withdrew some double-basses from Beethoven’s Choral Symphony . He did not merely guard the reputation of the old masters, but he was also a fierce advocate and defender of the new, and of those of the future. He was the first to introduce a song of Schubert’s into France ( L’Adieu ). For Legouvé, to see him play was like watching Fra Angelico painting in his cell, a medieval mystic at work.

The Stockhausens visited Urhan in his fifth-floor Paris apartment in 1839, and found him living in great simplicity in two rooms, with a piano and five stools in his bedroom, where they sat and were made very welcome. In 1843 Urhan encouraged their son Julius while he was in Paris. In November 1845 Julius wrote to inform his parents of Urhan’s death. He had been living in pitiable conditions in Belleville, and began to refuse his food: thoughts of suicide made him resolve to starve himself to death. He suffered agonies of pain and descended into a frenzy, giving terrible grief to his friends, none of whom could talk him out of it. All interventions failed, and Urhan, whom the Stockhausen and families considered their dear friend, and who had formerly taken communion every Sunday, lost his faith in God and his desire for life. Thus he died, quietly at last with friends at his bedside, on 2 November 1845.

[xsdc]

Oh you meant the channel.

Yes drop a link somewhere here if you find something you particularly like.

[prokmofo]

I just put on one of his playlists and let it run in the background while I worked. Beautiful stuff

[prokmofo]

So no pardickular cumposer, just, this guy really knows how to play the wickid instrument