Liszt: Hungarian Rhapsody No.12 (Kissin)

A vivacious and exuberant performance featuring some some superhuman feats of pianism. The second half in particular is real fun to listen to – starting from the stretta vivace at 7:26 things get fairly crazy. There’s nothing profound happening in the Hungarian Rhapsodies, but they showcase Liszt’s amazing ability to write exciting stuff for the piano – they’re ridiculous amounts of fun, very colourful, occasionally witty, and are always written with an addictive sense of propulsion. The Hungarian Rhapsody No.12 features (like its more popular C# minor twin, the Hungarian Rhapsody No.2) a particularly diverse huge array of pianistic textures. Sometimes music is just fun.