Was Liszt the greatest pianist ever?

[IRG CommandoJoe]

Of course there aren't any recordings of Franz Liszt and even if they were, it would be on a crappy shit-quality wax cylinder (or whatever it was they had at that time).

However, there could be other ways to gauge how great of a pianist he was. Were there any written accounts of anyone who has heard Liszt before and compared/contrasted his playing with other later pianists that were recorded? Or perhaps any pupils of Liszt who were said to have surpassed or achieved the same level of pianism as him?

Another way of gauging his virtuoisity is that he was supposed to be better than Frederic Chopin (by his own admission), and he was no slouch. I heard of some other pianist who rivaled him named Thalberg, but I don't know much about him.

Anyone able to offer up any information or speculation on this matter?

And yes, I realize that we will never know for sure. I just was curious if there was anything else I'm missing.

[Hawkwings]

How do you define "great"? Technical skill? I'm pretty sure there's some asian pianist alive today that's the greatest technical player ever. What about expressiveness? There's not way of even measuring that, and its extremely subjective. Best interpretation of the music? Well, that goes into the area of what the composer intended, and that's a whole other category.

[IRG CommandoJoe]

A vague term like "great" would combine all factors, naturally.

How do you define "great"? Technical skill? I'm pretty sure there's some asian pianist alive today that's the greatest technical player ever.

What makes you assume that? According to what I've read about Liszt he spent hours and hours on end at the piano mastering his technique with scales and other exercises. So what makes him any different from Asian pianists of today? (That might be what I'm missing.)

[Metatwaddle]

A vague term like "great" would combine all factors, naturally.

How do you define "great"? Technical skill? I'm pretty sure there's some asian pianist alive today that's the greatest technical player ever.

What makes you assume that? According to what I've read about Liszt he spent hours and hours on end at the piano mastering his technique with scales and other exercises. So what makes him any different from Asian pianists of today? (That might be what I'm missing.)

All serious concert pianists do that, actually. And yeah, young Chinese pianists these days are known for their technical skills. The real child prodigies sometimes have "stage parents" who force them to practice for multiple hours a day at very young ages. This happens everywhere, occasionally, but I think it's especially common in China (and sometimes happens among Chinese-Americans). They've produced some pretty cool pianists, though. Yundi Li is very good, for example. (Incidentally, I first heard of him when I bought an iTunes recording of him playing something by Liszt.) I'm not so big on Lang Lang, though; he seems to interpret most music the way he wants it to be (usually fast and loud), rather than really taking composers' intentions into account.

Liszt was supposed to be pretty incredible, yes. Hell, anyone who can play his music well has to be very, very good. But we really don't have enough evidence to say that he was the best in either area - technical skill or expressive brilliance. Besides, reasonable and educated people can disagree on what balance of personal expression, interpretive skill and virtuosity makes the "greatest" pianist. I personally put a higher premium on the first two, which is why my tastes run more towards people like Artur Rubinstein and Vladimir Horowitz, who were both great interpreters of Romantic-era music in particular.

I wish I'd lived to see them play.

[Sephirius]

he seems to interpret most music the way he wants it to be (usually fast and loud), rather than really taking composers' intentions into account.

I don't like to listen to piano pieces played 'as written' you can get a sequencer to do that sort of thing, I like interpretation in piano. It's one of the main reasons I hold Glenn Gould in the highest regard.

[Saurencaerthai]

Prior to recording, we really have little to gauge the abilities of performers, save for the accolades of others. Though some may wax poetic about a performer's abilities, in the end, it is impossible to fully evaluate nuance, technique, or interpretation without actually hearing it. Some people argue that there was a higher level of musicianship back then, however, I would argue that with the advent of recording, the bar was effectively raised, seeing as a mistake or misinterpretation could be recalled, rather than be left to memory. With that in mind, it is very well possible that there are pianists who very well could outplay him. One should also consider that the Steinways and Fazioli's of today are far more developed than the instruments he played on, so it is likely that piano technique as we know it has changed between now and then.