Yet he did and, thankfully, considerable insight may be gained from this as to his relationships, compositional methods - especially with regard to publication of his works - philosophical thoughts, attitudes to literature, to other composers, other artists in different spheres, even, though more rarely, his approach to politics and, equally important, his religious leanings.".

Shortly after Chopin's death in 1849, Franz Liszt wrote the first full-length biography of his fellow composer. As one of Chopin's friends, Liszt created a unique biography that allows the reader to experience the world of Chopin through the memories of one of his most adamant supporters. This translation is the starting volume of Janita Hall-Swadley's The Collected Writings of Franz Liszt, the very first production of Liszt's entire literary collection in English. In addition to the English translation of Liszt's Gesammelte Schriften, collected and edited by Lina Ramann and published in Germany in 1880/83, each volume contains a Foreword written by a scholar and expert on Liszt and that volume's topic. New research and perspectives in the field of Liszt studies are presented in the introduction to each book in the series, and the translations themselves are enhanced with annotations in accordance with modern standards of musicological research. In Volume 1, Liszt provides insight into Chopin's early childhood and musical development, the cultural traditions and customs that inspired the polonaises and mazurkas, and the final days and hours of the composer before he died. Liszt also offers the reader a psychological view of the composer that had not been seriously undertaken by anyone prior to Liszt. Although Liszt offered what some scholars regard as perhaps an idealized image of the composer, readers will enjoy the personal anecdotes and memories that only one close to the late composer could have known. Liszt even takes on the sensitive topic of the love affair between Chopin and the great French woman writer George Sand, much to the displeasure of the former's family. The Collected Writings of Franz Liszt: Volume 1: F. Chopin includes a thorough discussion of Liszt as an author and the tainted past that surrounded his writings beginning in the 1930s. The much neglected topic of Liszt’s relationship with his publishers is explored, and the critical questionnaires that Liszt had sent to Chopin’s sister in preparation for writing the biography are included. Finally, a discussion of the professional and personal relationship between Chopin and Liszt is provided, making this volume a valuable addition to the study of both composers.

This work traces the composer's German tours from Leipzig and Dresden to major cities like Munich and Berlin, and to such out-of-the-way places as Rolandseck, Solingen, Liegnitz, Jena, and Ludwigsburg. Cited or paraphrased in the text are quotations from more than 2,000 sources, many of them new to Liszt scholarship. Separate chapters are devoted to Liszt's reception by German critics, and to the German compositions Liszt completed for voice, male chorus, and piano during these tours. The book concludes with a listing of all Liszt's German concerts and with translations of fifteen especially lengthy and interesting reviews.

Franz Liszt's correspondence with the Comtesse Marie d'Agoult, herself a celebrated historian and the mother of Liszt's three children, has only recently been made available in anything like respectable form. A decade ago French scholar Serge Gut, together with Jacqueline Bellas, published a definitive edition of the surviving Liszt-d'Agoult letters, thereby replacing the heavily edited and incomplete edition of the 1830s. Working closely with Gut, Michael Short has translated the entire correspondence into English, adding new footnotes and references in the process. The bulk of the translated correspondence, containing more than 400 of the letters, will soon be available in an edition from Pendragon Press. As such, it will join Pauline Pocknell's edition of the Liszt-Agnes Street-Klindworth letters and Short's own edition of Liszt letters in the Library of Congress as No. 12 in Pendragon's Franz Liszt Studies Series edited by Michael Saffle.

First published in 2009. Routledge is an imprint of Taylor & Francis, an informa company.

Sébastien Erard and the firm that carried his name are seminal in the history of musical instruments. Erard's inventions - especially the double escapement for the piano and the double-action for the harp - have had an enormous impact on instruments and musical life and are still at the foundation of piano and harp building today. The recently discovered archives of the Erard piano and harp building firm are perhaps the largest and most complete record of musical instrument making anywhere, containing never-before-published correspondence from musicians including Mendelssohn, Liszt and Fauré. These volumes present the archive's records and documents in two parts, the first relating to inventions, business, composers and performers and the second to the Erard family correspondence. In both the original French and with English translations, the documents offer fascinating insights into the musical landscape of Europe from the start of Erard's career in 1785 to the closure of the firm in 1959.