Piano Concerto No. 1 (Liszt)

Béla Bartók described it as "the first perfect realisation of cyclic sonata form, with common themes being treated on the variation principle".

[3] A story exists that, to mock his critics, Liszt and his son-in-law, Hans von Bülow, put the words Das versteht ihr alle nicht, haha!

Following this, the piano plays fast, downward chromatic octaves, before recapitulating a section from earlier in the movement, this time in G major.

The movement finishes with the main theme played by the strings while the piano imitates a harp with fast, quiet arpeggios, culminating with an upwards chromatic scale in sixths, diminishing to ppp volume.

The section reaches a climax where a strong fortissimo is played followed by a descending diminuendo scale.

In the final few passages, a new chromatic theme is introduced in which the piano is playing semiquavers and triplet quavers at the same time, an exercise in polyrhythm, while in unison with the strings.

The piece ends in Liszt's bravura style, with the now-familiar downward chromatic octaves theme, played in this recapitulation at breakneck presto speed, before changing to contrary chromatic octaves, reaching the tonic key of E♭ major and fff dynamic.

This concerto is scored for a relatively small orchestra and calls for the following instruments: Solo piano Woodwinds: Brass: Percussion: Strings: