User:Wretchskull/Franz Liszt rewrite



Franz Liszt, born Franciscus List (22 October 1811 – 31 July 1886) was a Hungarian composer, virtuoso pianist, conductor, and organist of the Romantic era. He gained renown in Europe for his virtuostic skill at the piano and is widely regarded as one of the greatest pianists of all time.

Born in Doborján (modern-day Raiding), his father, Adam Liszt, a bureaucrat for the Esterházys, noticed his son's prodigious musical talent from an early age and eagerly seized every opportunity to develop it. At the age of nine, Liszt was already holding public performances, and with the help of Czerny, was able to continue studying music. In 1823, after a series of successful concerts in Vienna, Liszt and his father moved to Paris, the musical capital of Europe at the time. Ardent to continue studying, his admission to the Paris Conservatory was blocked as they only accepted French students. He continued giving concerts in France and habitually visited England to give concerts that occasionally featured royal visits. Liszt, upon the death of his father in Boulogne, reclused from public performances and moulded his religious beliefs that would persevere for the rest of his life.

Liszt gained renown in Europe during the early nineteenth century for his prodigious virtuosic skill as a pianist. Popular among women, he was known for his enthralling attractiveness. The term Lisztomania was coined, which explained an unprecedented fan frenzy during his performances. Liszt was greatly influenced by Niccolò Paganini to become a virtuoso at the piano and dedicated numerous compositions and transcriptions to him. He was also a friend, musical promoter and benefactor to many composers of his time, including Frédéric Chopin, Charles-Valentin Alkan, Richard Wagner and Hector Berlioz.

A prolific composer, Liszt was one of the most prominent representatives of the New German School (Neudeutsche Schule). He left behind an extensive and diverse body of work that influenced his forward-looking contemporaries and anticipated 20th-century ideas and trends. Among Liszt's musical contributions were the symphonic poem, developing thematic transformation as part of his experiments in musical form, and radical innovations in harmony.

Family
Sebastian List [sic] is the earliest known male ancestor of the composer, whom he was his great-grandfather. During the first half of the 18th century, Sebastian was one of many German-speaking serfs who migrated to Hungary from Austria. A poor cotter blessed with longevity, he fathered three children with his first wife Anna Roth and lived to be 90 years old. The last child, Georg List, became Franz Liszt's grandfather. Georg, a competent musician who served for the Esterházys, worked as a schoolteacher, cantor and notary. Of his 25 children he fathered with his three wives, three inherited his musical traits; one of whom was Adam, Franz's soon-to-be father.

Childhood
Franciscus List was born on 22 October 1811 in Doborján (modern-day Raiding) in the Kingdom of Hungary, Austrian Empire. His father, Adam List, himself a skilled cantor, pianist, cellist, and guitarist, worked as a self-described ovium rationista ("sheep accountant").

Useful link: Franz Liszt, Talk:Franz Liszt, WikiProject Composers

For later: Czerny later dismissed teaching him as he suspected that his father was using his son for monetary gain.