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In 1848, at the height of his fame as the greatest pianist in Europe, Liszt made a decision that many of his admirers found incomprehensible: he settled in the small German town of Weimar and shackled himself in service to the court in the role of Kapellmeister of their mediocre orchestra. This decision had been preceded by a highly successful period of relentless concert touring throughout the late 1830s and 1840s. It was a time of financial security, constant adulation and hysterical fans. Yet, in Weimar, Liszt was about to embark on the most fertile period of his life as a composer, completing the B minor Sonata, twelve symphonic poems, the Faust and Dante symphonies, the final versions of his piano concertos, and numerous Lieder.
The Weimar stage offered a rich environment in which Liszt could develop his compositional ideas alongside his regular work in the theatre, conducting opera and occasionally incidental music. Crucially, it provided an important context in which to develop the genre of the symphonic poem (a one-movement orchestral work with an 'extra-musical' programme). All but one of the symphonic poems had their premieres in Weimar, and these mostly took place in the context of a festival or dramatic production, to which Liszt's music often functioned as an overture and was tailored in terms of subject matter, form and choice of forces. Yet, this important compositional and performance context has been largely overlooked. 1
The Weimar Court Theatre also provided the context for the composition of the last of Liszt's Weimar symphonic poems: Hamlet (1858). In this case Liszt's attempt to unite programme with symphonic form resulted in a piece that is unique among the symphonic poems in the sheer detail of its responses to its programme and its attempt to substitute the visual and spoken elements of Shakespeare's play in music. This is reflected in the unusual subtitle that Liszt attached to an early draft of the work: 'Vorspiel [Prelude] zu Shakespeares Drama'. Since 1854 Liszt had completely given up the use of terms such as 'overture' in connection with his symphonic poems, so this return is highly suggestive. Indeed, it seems to have encouraged the listener to hear the piece as an...