Années de pèlerinage

                Années de pèlerinage (French for "Years of Pilgrimage") (S.160, S.161, S.163)

        is a set of three suites for solo piano by Franz Liszt. Much of it derives from his earlier 

        work, Album d'un voyageur, his first major published piano cycle, which was composed 

        between 1835 and 1838 and published in 1842. Années de pèlerinage is widely considered 

        as the masterwork and summation of Liszt's musical style. The third volume is notable as 

        an example of his later style.  Composed well after the first two volumes, it displays less 

        virtuosity and more harmonic experimentation.

                The title Années de pèlerinage refers to Goethe's famous novel of self-realization, 

        Wilhelm Meister's Apprenticeship, and especially its sequel Wilhelm Meister's Journeyman 

        Years (whose original title Wilhelm Meisters Wanderjahre meant "Years of Wandering or 

        Years of Pilgrimage", the latter being used for its first French translation). Liszt clearly 

        places the work in line with the Romantic literature of his time, prefacing most pieces 

        with a literary passage from writers such as Schiller, Byron or Senancour, and, in an 

        introduction to the entire work, writing:

                "Having recently travelled to many new countries, through different settings and

                places consecrated by history and poetry; having felt that the phenomena of nature 

                and their attendant sights did not pass before my eyes as pointless images but stirred 

                deep emotions in my soul, and that between us a vague but immediate relationship 

                had established itself, an undefined but real rapport, an inexplicable but undeniable 

                communication, I have tried to portray in music a few of my strongest sensations 

                and most lively impressions."


Première année:  Suisse, S. 160  (published 1855)

      1.  Chapelle de Guillaume Tell (William Tell's Chapel) in C major 

             For this depiction of the Swiss struggle for liberation Liszt chooses a motto from Schiller as caption, 

             "All for one – one for all."  A noble passage marked lento opens the piece, followed by the main melody 

             of the freedom fighters. A horn call rouses the troops, echoes down the valleys, and mixes with the sound 

             of the heroic struggle.

      2.  Au lac de Wallenstadt (At Lake Wallenstadt) in A♭ major 

             Liszt's caption is from Lord Byron's Childe Harold's Pilgrimage (Canto 3 LXVIII – CV): "Thy contrasted 

             lake / With the wild world I dwell in is a thing / Which warns me, with its stillness, to forsake / Earth's

             troubled waters for a purer spring."  In her Mémoires, Liszt's mistress and traveling companion of the

             time, Marie d'Agoult, recalls their time by Lake Wallenstadt, writing, "Franz wrote for me there a melon-

             choly harmony, imitative of the sigh of the waves and the cadence of oars, which I have  never been able 

             to hear without weeping."

      3.  Pastorale in E major 

      4.  Au bord d'une source (Beside a Spring) in A♭ major

           Liszt's caption is from Schiller:  “In the whispering coolness begins young nature’s play.”

      5.  Orage (Storm) in C minor '

             Liszt's caption is from Lord Byron's Childe Harold's Pilgrimage (Canto 3 LXVIII – CV): “But where 

             of ye, O tempests! is the goal? / Are ye like those within the human breast? / Or do ye find, at length,  

              like eagles, some high nest?”

      6.  Vallée d'Obermann (Obermann's Valley) in E minor

              Inspired by Étienne Pivert de Senancour's novel of the same title, set in Switzerland, with a hero over-

              whelmed and confused by nature, suffering from ennui and longing, finally concluding that only our

              feelings are true.  The captions include one from Byron's Childe Harold's Pilgrimage ("Could I embody 

              and unbosom now / That which is most within me,--could I wreak / My thoughts upon expression, and  

              thus throw / Soul--heart--mind--passions--feelings--strong or weak-- / All that I would have sought, and 

              all I seek, / Bear, know, feel--and yet breathe--into one word, / And that one word were Lightning, I would  

              speak / But as it is, I live and die unheard, / With a most voiceless thought, sheathing it as a sword.") and 

              two from Senancour's Obermann, which include the crucial questions, “What do I want? Who am I? What 

              do I ask of nature?"

     7.  Eglogue (Eclogue) in A♭ major

            Liszt's caption is from Childe Harold's Pilgrimage (Canto 3 LXVIII): "The morn is up again, the dewy 

            morn, / With breath all incense, and with cheek all bloom, / Laughing the clouds away with playful scorn, /

            And living as if earth contained no tomb!"

     8.  Le mal du pays (Homesickness) in E minor 

     9.  Les cloches de Genève: Nocturne (The Bells of Geneva: Nocturne) in B major

            Liszt's caption is from Byron's Childe Harold's Pilgrimage: “I live not in myself, but I become / Portion 

            of that around me”


Deuxième année:  Italie, S. 161  (published 1858)

      1.  Sposalizio (Marriage of the Virgin, a painting by Raphael) in E major

      2.  Il penseroso (The Thinker, a statue by Michelangelo) in C♯ minor

      3.  Canzonetta del Salvator Rosa (Canzonetta of Salvator Rosa; 

             This song "Vado ben spesso cangiando loco" was in fact written by Giovanni Bononcini in A major.


      4.  Sonetto 47 del Petrarca (Petrarch's Sonnet 47) in D♭ major

      5.  Sonetto 104 del Petrarca (Petrarch's Sonnet 104) in E major

      6.  Sonetto 123 del Petrarca (Petrarch's Sonnet 123) in A♭ major

      7.  Après une lecture de Dante: Fantasia Quasi Sonata (After Reading Dante: Fantasia Quasi Sonata) 

           in D minor



Supplement:  Venezia e Napoli (Venice and Naples).  Composed in 1859 as a partial revision of an earlier set with the same name composed around 1840. Published in 1861 as a supplement to the Second Year

      1.  Gondoliera (Gondolier's Song) in F♯ major 

             Based on the song "La biondina in gondoletta" by Giovanni Battista Peruchini.

      2.  Canzone (Canzone) in E♭ minor

             Based on the gondolier's song "Nessun maggior dolore" from Rossini's Otello.


      3.  Tarantella (Tarantella) in G minor – Uses themes by Guillaume-Louis Cottrau, 1797–1847.


Troisième année, S. 163  (published 1883)

      1.  Angélus! Prière aux anges gardiens (Angelus! Prayer to the Guardian Angels) in E major

             Dedicated to Daniela von Bülow, Liszt's granddaughter, first daughter of Hans von Bülow and Cosima 

             Liszt and wife of art historian Henry Thode. It was written for both melodeon, piano, or an instrument 

             that combines both, for Liszt wrote "piano-melodium" on his manuscript.

      2.  Aux cyprès de la Villa d'Este I: Thrénodie (To the Cypresses of the Villa d'Este I: Threnody) 

           in G minor

      3.  Aux cyprès de la Villa d'Este II: Thrénodie (To the Cypresses of the Villa d'Este II: Threnody) 

           in E minor 

             The Villa d'Este described in these two threnodies is in Tivoli, near Rome.  It is famous for its beautiful 

              cypresses and fountains

      4.  Les jeux d'eaux à la Villa d'Este (The Fountains of the Villa d'Este) in F♯ major 

             Over the music, Liszt placed the inscription, "Sed aqua quam ego dabo ei, fiet in eo fons aquae 

             salientis in vitam aeternam" ("But the water that I shall give him shall become in him a well of water 

             springing up into eternal life," from the Gospel of John)

      5.  Sunt lacrymae rerum/En mode hongrois (There are Tears for Things/In Hungarian Style) 

           in A minor – Dedicated to Hans von Bülow.

      6.  Marche funèbre, En mémoire de Maximilian I, Empereur du Mexique (Funeral March, 

           In memory of Emperor Maximilian of Mexico) in F minor

       7.  Sursum corda (Lift Up Your Hearts) in E major