Réminiscences de Lucia di Lammermoor, S.397 & S.398 - Franz Liszt/Gaetano Donizetti

Franz Liszt/Gaetano Donizetti: Réminiscences de Lucia di Lammermoor de Donizetti ‘Fantaisie dramatique’ (final version), S.397 & S.398.

0:00 - 1. Andante Final (third version), S.397
5:05 - 2. Marche Funèbre et Cavatine, S.398

Liszt’s Lucia fantasy turned out to be so large that the original publisher insisted on its being split into two works. Here they are at last re-united by juxtaposition, and thus the similarity of their codas will not go unnoticed. The first part—published as Opus 13 and subtitled ‘Fantaisie dramatique’—is founded upon the closing sextet, and the second upon the scene at the tomb. Together they represent the best of Liszt’s early operatic fantasies. (notes by Leslie Howard)

The sextet is one of the greatest pieces in the literature; when Enrico Caruso sang it in New York, such pandemonium broke loose that policemen stormed into the Met thinking that a riot had broken out. It is the pivotal point of the opera, with its conflicting and interwoven emotions of the enraged Edgar, the remorseful Enrico, the scarcely sane Lucia, and the sundry other rogues and varlets. Liszt's transcription commences in 3/4 time and, after its syncopated introduction, mirrors the orchestral and vocal parts before becoming airborne with a fluttering cadenza passage leading to a lovely arperggio throughout the upper half of the keyboard. The time signature then changes to 9/8, and the theme is developed in right-hand chords while the left is occupied by a series of arpeggios and intermittent trills, softly played, but which by their continuous presence and increasing dynamics serve to create a sense of considerable emotional pressure. Liszt then notches up the temperature by inverting the right-hand-left-hand treatment of melody and accompaniment; the climax is finally reached when that tensely repressed accompaniment bursts through the surface of the melody. The artistry involved in creating this cathartic result is astonishing in its uncanny preservation of the sense and feel of the original work as encased in a vivid, dreamlike state. At last, the piece then closes with a return in 3/4 to the original theme, which then fragments into booming left and right-hand chords before once again coalescing into a final rollercoaster arpeggio that brings the music to a close.

The musical material which is used [in the second part] is taken from the scena and final aria of Act III, and from the finale of Act II, but the nine bars of introduction, with their muffled tremolos and biting chromaticism, are Liszt's invention. Overall, Liszt's fantasy is astonishing in its substantial preservation of the sense of drama, which all culminates in the stupefying FFFF intrusion of the accompaniment figure from the Sextet as a coup de théâtre which no doubt would have brought the house down when performed by Liszt. (notes by Andrei Cristian Anghel)


Adolf von Henselt's version of the Andante Final:    • Andante Final de Lucia di Lammermoor, S.39...  

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