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Here is what Delacroix recorded in his journal about Chopin's remarks on Beethoven:

Friday 2nd February 1949
In the evening, I talked of music with Chopin, Grzymala and Alkan. He thinks that Beethoven was obsessed by the idea of Bach. He based much of his work on Bach.
[I assume here that 'he' was Chopin but it could of course be Alkan who is being quoted.)

Saturday, 7th April 1849
Went with Chopin for his drive at about half-past three...
I asked him to explain what it is that gives the impression of logic in music. He made me understand the meaning of harmony and counterpoint; how in music the fugue corresponds to pure logic, and that to be well versed in the fugue is to understand the elements of all reason and development in music. I thought how happy I should have been to study these things, the despair of commonplace musicians. It gave me some idea of the pleasure which true philosophers find in science. The fact of the matter is that true science is not what we usually mean by that word – not, that is to say, a part of knowledge quite separate from art. No, science, as regarded and demonstrated by a man like Chopin, is art itself, but on the other hand art is not what the vulgar believe it to be, a vague inspiration coming from nowhere, moving at random, and portraying merely the picturesque, external side of things. It is pure reason, embellished by genius, but following a set course and bound by higher laws. And here I come back to the difference between Mozart and Beethoven. As Chopin said to me, “Where Beethoven is obscure and appears to be lacking in unity, it is not, as people allege, from a rather wild originality – the quality which they admire in him – it is because he turns his back on eternal principles.” Mozart never does this.

These are the only instances where Delacroix mentions Chopin speaking of Beethoven.

Thanks for hunting that down! Do you have the rest of the quote, where he mentions Beethoven's trouble with intervals?

To get back to the original question posed by lordlactose:
1) Chopin certainly didn't have a 'nasty personality' or he'd never have made so many true friends in his lifetime, who described him in the highest possible terms of love and admiration. Liszt was fond of him too.
2) I think the reason Liszt and Chopin didn't have a closer friendship was three-fold. First, as has already been said, their lady-loves quarrelled. Secondly, they were often not in the same place or even the same country (Liszt wasn't in France when Chopin died). Thirdly, as men they were simply too different from each other. Liszt was all for show and drama; he was an unfaithful lover and father and had tendencies to peasant crudity. That isn't to say he didn't also have many good points of course. But Chopin had unusual values for his milieu, hating to have to show off in public and placing great importance on family values and integrity within personal relationships. He also had a much more aristocratic upbringing, so I should imagine he cringed a little at Liszt's behaviour sometimes. As Frycek so wisely indicated, Liszt improved with age but by then Chopin had met an early death.

No, I don't remember anything about trouble with intervals!

This is my take on it too, and thanks Frycek! I have read all three of the Alan Walker books. Highly recommended.

The contrast between the personalities of Chopin and Liszt will go on indefinitely, and why not. They were both tremendously gifted men, but it seems a bit late in the day to worry about their failings, which were quite evenly distributed.

Received critical commentary generally tells us that Chopin's music is greater than Liszt's. Perhaps.

But of all the 'great' composers, Chopin has written IMO the highest percentage of music which I'm just plain tired of listening to. After hearing the Ab polonaise on the radio yesterday, what more is there to say about this tired warhorse?

Chopin is ironically a victim of his own perfection. I can listen to Liszt's C# minor rhapsody forever, but another Chopin Scherzo or Ballade? Oh gawd. The etudes? Yeah, we know they're harder than Liszt's, no new grand revelations there.

Chopin needs to be put to bed for a generation. With every year I like this man's music less and less. It's been ages since I have purchased a Chopin CD, his relevance has peaked, though I imagine no one will agree.

Different strokes - - -
(through overexposure even perfection can come to be perceived as banal, much as I imagine the conventional idea of Heaven to be deadly dull - -though this is not my experience with Chopin's music - unlearned ignoramous that I am, the more I hear, and play, the more I see - I believe you may feel the same way about Elgar)

And I wonder what happened to our OP - - -

Well Frycek, that was very well put. Elgar's music gains in stature for me every year, but so do many other composers.

HOWEVER: please do me a great favour and do not refer to yourself as an 'ignoramus'. That's a joke and you know it. I have always appreciated your contributions on this board, and you strike me as an incredibly fine and knowledgeable individual.

While I have not mastered all of the etudes, I am dumbfounded less by Chopin's than by Liszt's 5th transcendental etude.



I agree!

Actually, no, it's not. You may notice I never comment on theory - - because I know very little- nor post my recordings because I don't play all that well. I'm basically self taught and sometimes scare myelf by simply pondering the depths of my own ignorance. But I can be taught - - -

Every remark attributed to Liszt regarding his appraisal of Chopin appears to be unstinting praise. Chopin was the only pianist-composer of Liszt's generation that he truly admired, and even idolized. And apparently Chopin was the only pianist that Liszt did not regard as a rival to be demolished and disposed of (as with Thalberg).

Liszt was legendary for his charm and kindness to students as well as visitors from around the world who came to pay him homage. But he was far from gracious to rival pianists. Liszt's attitude toward Rubinstein was far one of caution and aloofness, at best. Rubinstein resented the treatment and reciprocated the attitude with an extra twist of spite, as his autobiography makes clear. Both parties put on airs of civility of course, but the undercurrent of rivalry was always evident.

A point-counterpoint comparison of Chopin's output contemporaneous to that of Liszt's demonstrates, to my ears (others may disagree, of course) that Chopin was the more focused and profound artist, and certainly the most innovative. It is to Liszt's credit that he did not recoil with resentment (competitive as he was) but instead, very frankly admired and befriended Chopin, a complex personality of infinite subtlety, and with whom one could not be too careless.

As I believe someone previously indicated, Chopin's early death denied him the opportunity to witness Liszt mature into his stature as a composer. I doubt, however, that Chopin would have been much interested. Chopin, like Mozart before him, or Debussy afterward, was one of those geniuses who is a universe unto himself, and for whom once his methods and values were set early in life, felt little need thereafter to refer to other artists for ideas.

As I once again work my way through Chopin's preludes and etudes, I am astounded that a youth barely into his twenties could encompass such worlds of pain and beauty into a language of unprecedented originality. The first prelude, for instance, could almost have been written by a youthful Schoenberg and no one would questioned it (I am exaggerating, but not by much). In that regard Chopin was even more of a prodigy than Mozart or Mendelssohn.

Thank you for making this point. Your perspective encourages a more thoughtful appreciation for Chopin's known talent for friendship. Too many biographies seem to lavish attention on Chopin's break-up with Sand, or Liszt's bedroom burlesque with some lady in Chopin's quarters (whatever that was about).

Chopin's only social 'problem', if you will, was his sheer intelligence. He was not one to act the vulgar frat-boy just to get along with the guys. He knew exactly his worth no less than Beethoven or Wagner knew theirs, and bearing that in mind, he was an incomparably more civilized and admirable man by comparison.

Funny that you put it like this. The past semester, I was playing in an all Chopin recital, played the E-flat minor polonaise. By the end of the semester I just felt done with Chopin for a while. When me and my teacher discussed repertoire for the summer and following semester, I literally was almost begging not to play Chopin for a while. She was wishing me to play the Grande Polonaise.
I do wish to play this piece, but not now, I wish to explore other romantic composers, though sometimes it feels like there is only one to pick from!

My teacher wanted me to do a piece with orchestra, I talked her into Liszt's first concerto.

Rather vulgar way to put it. Were you there at the time and aware of the stakes involved? Thalberg's music has a pusillanimous comfort to it which must have made Liszt laugh.


Yes, but do you know what Rubinstein said about Liszt's music? He called him 'no composer'. Funny thing, who was it that so utterly influenced the Russian Big 5: Liszt or Rubinstein?

I was not aware that Chopin wrote any symphonic poems, a genre Liszt basically pioneered. Was that not innovative? Furthermore, his choral music (of which he wrote more of than Chopin's entire catalog of piano music), particularly the Via Crucis, haunted Catholic composers for years. Not until Dupré did we get another horribly stark evocation of the 12 Stations.


This is fair enough, and well stated (thank-you!), nothing I can particularly argue with. I will simply go back to an earlier post I made in this thread: personally there's just something about Chopin's almost smug genius that -for me- has less and less relevance with every year. I may only be 28, but Mozart and Mendelssohn gain in stature for me every year. I guess Chopin was just too good. I'm tired of him. Sorry mate...

Chopin's music is great, until it gets served with extra schmalz. I am getting really tired of pianists dissolving into distorted puddles at the pedals while playing any and every Chopin piece.. Rubato merging into "finger vibrato" and all pedals down seems to be a la mode now. I personally can't wait for the bicentennial year to move on.

Liszt praised Alkan as well, and always paid Alkan a visit when Paris.

I think Liszt is probably one of the most underrated composers of the 19th century.

Really? Personally I think very highly of Liszt. His sonata is one of few pieces that knock the breath out of me. His Funerailles is another.

I think so, and let me tell you, i did not like Liszt that much until i gave him some time. The Sonata, for example, took me quite some time to really enjoy; i even think i am still on that process!
But i was talking more about Liszt's non piano music. His orchestral works; that is te part of Liszt's works that i think do not have the recognition they deserve yet. My impression is that LIszt's piano music has overshadowed the rest of his works. Hopefully that will change at some point?

Well, I definitely plead guilty to that. Any favorite non piano suggestions to begin my education?

His tone poems are supposed to be fairly good, and a few of his symphonies. I just finished listening to a lecture on Liszt and his life, and they talked about these pieces. The one that comes to mind is one symphony dealing with Faust - each movement describes a character in the story, and the last movement depicts Mephistopheles and how he goes about changing Faust's musical theme (the lecturer mentions Mephistopheles ability to only destroy, not create - so his musical themse are closely related to and made up of Faust's). Very interesting stuff. He dedicated it to Hector Berlioz - The Faust Symphony.

In the end, his piano repetoire is so immense, it's almost impossible to judge Liszt without putting that at the forefront - though he spent a large amount of time furthering the careers of other musicians. He was the only conductor brave enough to consistently stage Wagner's works, when Wagner was very unpopular. Wagner was nice enough to pay him back by stealing Liszt's daughter from her husband heh heh.