LDV95

OLIVIER LATRY 25 The disc ends with the Fantasy and Fugue on ‘Ad nos, ad salutarem undam’, which is also the most ambitious work in Liszt’s whole catalogue of organ works – already in terms of its duration. Saint-Saëns, whom we have already mentioned, said it was ‘the most extraordinary piece that exists for organ’ . . . It all started with the triumph of Meyerbeer’s opera Le Prophète in Paris in 1849. Liszt published his work in a version for organ or pedal piano in 1852. Alexander Winterberger premiered it in 1855 at the inauguration of the Merseburg Cathedral organ. The score is comparable in dimensions and structure to the Piano Sonata in B minor. Its prodigiously conceived tonal scheme progresses from C to F sharp (the Adagio), then from F sharp back to C. The harmony is, as it were, Wagnerian avant la lettre , exploiting the diminished ninth chord to stimulate the most audacious chromatic development. What fascinates me even more is the use in a continuous work of the chorale of the opera’s three Anabaptists (Zacharie, Mathisen and Jonas), in such a way that each bar of it is revealed as possessing a thematic function. Liszt creates a paraphrase within the paraphrase and renews the language of the organ with total freedom, yet the structure loses none of its coherence. This is undoubtedly the work on the programme that calls for the greatest investment and imagination in terms of registration. Liszt captivates the listener with contrasts of dynamics and tempo, rapidity of gesture, theatrical artifices, and the use of an orchestral language. He himself wrote in a letter that he could imagine hearing bells in certain passages. The percussionist François Garnier lent me his assistance for occasional interventions. After all, we were in a concert hall and I was sitting where the conductor normally stands . . .