Reception
The sonata was published by Breitkopf & Härtel in 1854 and first performed on January 27, 1857 in Berlin by Liszt's pupil and son-in-law, Hans von Bülow. It was attacked by conservative critics such as Eduard Hanslick, Johannes Brahms (who reputedly fell asleep during Liszt's performance of the work at their first meeting), and the pianist and composer Anton Rubinstein. However, the sonata drew an enthusiastic compliment from Richard Wagner following a private performance of the piece by Karl Klindworth in 1855. Otto Gumprecht of the German newspaper Nationalzeitung referred to it as "an invitation to hissing and stomping". It took a long time for the Sonata to become commonplace in concert repertoire both because of its technical difficulty and negative initial reception due to its status as “new” music. However by the early stages of the twentieth century, the piece had become established as a pinnacle of Liszt’s repertoire and has been a popularly performed and extensively analyzed piece ever since.
Read more about this topic: Piano Sonata (Liszt)
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