Mikael Rasmusson on Leslie Howard's complete Liszt:

>As for (especially) Gramophone reviews of the Hyperion series, I don't
>take them seriously since I discovered that horrible review of the Complete
>Works for Piano and Orchestra.  It seems like Howard/Liszt got some real
>enemies amongst some of the reviewers in that magazine.

Well Mikael, you know your Liszt, so it's good to hear you say that.  That
review (along with the Fanfare one) scared me off the Piano and Orchestra
set even though I wanted the works included on it very, very much.  So in
your opinion it's a good set? Obviously I'm after it for the works other
than the 2 concertos, I've already got Arrau and Richter for those.

The critics (Gramophone, Fanfare, ARG) seemed to think that Howard's
series is better in the earlier volumes, when he was fresher out of the
gate.  The implicaation was that his playing gets somewhat fatigued as the
series goes on.  I'd be interested to hear your opinion on that matter.  I
have only volumes 2 and 3 (indispensible programmes in both cases) and the
Recitatives with Piano volume (who, I ask you could read a desription of
Die Traurige Monch and not immediately need to hear it?!)

How are his Transcendental Etudes? The closest I've come to a winner is the
1958 Lazar Berman on BMG Melodiya: perfect performance, horrendous sound.
Seems like the pianists who have the fingers for the Etudes mostly don't
have the soul, and the ones with the soul don't have the fingers (I wish
Arrau had recorded them 10 years earlier).  I know Berman did them again
later but I've never seen that on CD.  Jon Lewis [log in to unmask]

"Jon Lewis" <[log in to unmask]>