Années de Pèlerinage / Suisse

Liszt’s views of music and in particular its relation with nature, art and literature has met much opposition from more conservative parts of the musical world of that time. His opponents, notably Robert Schumann, Johannes Brahms and the violinist Joseph Joachim, were horrified by Liszt’s concept of the ‘Unity of Arts’. To them, music was an absolute and self-contained art form, which stood on a much higher level than the more down to earth disciplines like painting and poetry, and had nothing to do with the reality of our daily lives.