Originally posted by Daniel--:
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As a side note, I often wonder what would have happened had Cziffra took an interest in recording some of Alkan's and / or Mozkowski's works ... oh ... only in my dreams!

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Originally posted by Goldberg:
Max, where did you hear that he debuted with the A major concerto? And, what do you mean "debut" exactly?

You might be right, of course--I'm an enormous fan of Cziffra, as most people who know me are aware, but I'm not even close to being a great authority on him. Still, I haven't heard that yet about the Liszt concerto. I wouldn't expect you to make such a mistake, but for what it's worth you might be thinking of the 2nd Bartok concerto, which I *think* he actually "debuted" (that is, he made the first concert performance of it--could be wrong), and it was his most important performance prior to his international career.

However, since I don't think you could have confused the two, maybe what you mean is that once he escaped from Hungary, his first performance internationally was of the 2nd Liszt concerto? That might be the case...it's interesting, and also that he played Alkan, which I've heard before. And, speaking of concerti and unheard of Cziffra performances, maybe Koji can also refresh my memory on a performance I remember reading about involving Cziffra, Mozart, and Argentina. I think it was his only time playing Mozart in a performance (a piano concerto), and the conductor angered him so much that Cziffra called him a "fat, insolent pig" or something of the sort, before vowing never to play in the country again.

I don't know whether or not that's how the story goes, but it's still pretty entertaining. [/b]

Originally posted by Varcon:
For the 2nd Liszt you might look up the Robert Casadesus recording. The one I have is coupled with the von Weber Concertstuck and both are really well done. Odd that Casadesus isn't among the famous ones mentioned frequently here. [/b]