Expression of the essence of a complex set of emotions is not accomplished through plastic formal perfection ...
Listening music with the partition to verify the playing is not the way to listen music... Elementary teaching is not playing nor listening ...
Here we propose 4 top pianists and ask the question , which of them give the impression that Lucifer and Mephisto themselves play at the piano ?
The projection of an emotion mesmerizing the crowds as Liszt did, the first pianist putting crowds in trance , cannot be only the mere "representation" of emotions in a perfect -plastic way...It takes a power to put a spell in the way Mephisto was able to do to buy the soul of Faust or even of crowds... How Liszt was able to create a music piece able to describe the spell as working ? How a pianist can do it really not as a mere esthetical moment, but really convey the spell itself as working really ?
For me Ervin Nyiregyhazi win...
Fiorentino amazing beautiful version :
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=vSaQB5YXV7g&list=PLMeOYP-ZXc_2THgAtVRu9yEOlvDVIc0E-&index=6
Ervin Nyiregyházi imperfect but stunning spell version :
mephisto valses no1
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=FpzW7RH0cgY
Now try the second mephisto waltzes:
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=wtSHsZj566Q
Horowitz:
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=JPE83YfNcZY
Richter:
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=lIWqTWeVKKk
Which version put you in front of the devil playing himself ?
Which version does not give a mere"representation" of the evil madness but give you the evil madness itself playing in you ?
For me it is without even without a doubt E. N. who does not even try to play well but instead play powerfully ...So much we feel uncomfortable ...Incredible vertigo confronted with madness ..
if you think that E.N. is a failed pianist unable to play perfection listen to this :
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=jIC-bGI_Frc
«Ervin Nyiregyházi was a direct pianistic descendant of Liszt and Beethoven, as he studied with: Erno Dohnányi, a pupil of Eugen d’Albert, a pupil of Franz Liszt, a pupil of Carl Czerny, a pupil of Ludwig van Beethoven .
Arnold Schoenberg wrote the following about Ervin Nyiregyházi: "...a pianist who appears to be something really quite extraordinary... I must say that I have never heard such a pianist before... What he plays is expression in the older sense of the word, nothing else; but such power of expression I have never heard before. You will disagree with his tempis as much as I did. You will also note that he often seems to give primacy to sharp contrasts at the expense of form, the latter appearing to get lost. I say appearing to; for then, in its own way, his music surprisingly regains its form, makes sense, establishes its own boundaries. The sound he brings out of the piano is unheard of... And such fullness of tone, achieved without ever becoming rough, I have never before encountered... as a whole it displays incredible novelty and persuasiveness. ...it is amazing what he plays and how he plays it". »