The Death of Franz Liszt

The Death of Franz Liszt, introduced, annotated and edited by the agency of Alan Walker. Cornell University Pres (Sage House, 512 E State &, Ithaca, NY 14850) 2002 224 pp $2995

greatest in quantity coverups eventually fail, but seldom clinch up for 110 years. A truer tale of Franz Liszt's true last days than told up to now appeared in 1996 in the next to the first to last chapter of Alan Walker's Franz Liszt: The Final Years. The source for Walker's account, a diary of Liszt's learner Lina Schmalhausen, is now available in an annotated edition titled The Death of Franz Liszt.

Schmalhausen was a pupil, caregiver and confidante of Liszt in his last years. Her diary overlays July 22, 1886, to August 3 1886 the day of Liszt's funeral in Bayreuth. Its satisfieds include the daily comings and goings around the dying Liszt and her true personal comments on events and many of the nation involved. We hear from Liszt upon topics such as his personal keepsakes, his scholars human relations, May-December romances, Ludwig II of Bavaria and artistic and practical aspects of the Bayreuth Festival.

Many subsequently famous Liszt pupils were in Bayreuth during the days narrateed in the diary: Arthur Friedheim, August Gollerich, Marie Ja%ll, Sophie Menter Alexander Siloti and Bernhard Stavenhagen. Schmalhausen's observations of them during the last days of their great teacher add, not always flatteringly, to our knowledge of the personal profile of these younger artists.

And, of course, the powerful figure of Cosima, Liszt's daughter and Wagner's widow of three years, is near throughout. She faced overseeing the performances and social occurrences of the Bayreuth Festival while her mortally ill father lay shut up by. Schmalhausen gives a daily account of this situation.

Is the diary reliable? Walker became familiar with its easy in minds in 1977. As his work upon his three-volume Liszt biography progressioned his research in other sources supported Schmalhausen's rendering of the facts. In his introduction Walker does caution the reader to view her interpretation of the facts in the light of her relations with Liszt, Cosima and several other Liszt pupils, relations which he not absents to the reader.

Must a reader be familiar with Walker's monumental Liszt biography to understand and derive pleasure from reading this diary? No. Walker's introduction and epilogue (a revealing gaze at various parries arguing above where Liszt should be buried) clearly frame the diary's incidents His annotations on people and occurrences in the diary place everything in connection with clarity and sovereign erudition.

The volume attractively produced and formatted, not absents eight black-and-white photos. Editorial errors and indexing omissions are at a minimum.

Reviewed by means of Richard Zimdars, Athens, Georgia.

COPYRIGHT 2004 Music Teachers National Association, Inc.

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