First steps After Thalberg's stay in London in May 1837, he made a first, short tour, giving concerts in several towns in
Great Britain, but he became ill and soon returned to Vienna. In spring 1838, he gave concerts in Paris again. A note in the
Revue et Gazette musicale of 4 March 1838 shows that Thalberg's fame had in the meantime grown. He was now called "the most famous of our composers". Thalberg left Paris on 18 April 1838, travelling to Vienna, the very same day that Liszt gave there a charity concert for the benefit of the victims of a
flood in Hungary. Thalberg invited Liszt for dinner, and the two great pianists dined together on the 28th with Prince Moritz Dietrichstein, who told Liszt that he was delighted to have "
Castor and Pollux" together in his home. During the evening, Thalberg remarked to Liszt with admirable candour: "In comparison with you, I have never enjoyed more than a ''succes d'estime'' in Vienna". They dined again the next day, after Liszt's concert on 29 April 1838. Liszt and Thalberg were both dinner guests of
Metternich. During Liszt's stay in Vienna, Thalberg did not perform at all. In October 1838, Thalberg became acquainted with Schumann. According to Schumann's diary, Thalberg played from memory
études by Chopin,
Joseph Christoph Kessler, and
Ferdinand Hiller. He also played with great skill and inspiration works by Beethoven,
Schubert, and
Dussek, as well as sight-reading Schumann's
Kreisleriana, Op. 16. On 27 November 1838, Thalberg took part in a charity concert, playing his new ''Fantasia on Rossini's '
La Donna del Lago'
, Op. 40 ("The Lady of the Lake" after Walter Scott). At one of his own "Farewell concerts" on 1 December 1838, he played three of his 12 Etudes
, Op. 26; his Op. 33 (Moses
); and his Fantasia on Beethoven's
7th Symphony, Op. 39. As a result, in the Neue Zeitschrift für Musik'' of 8 March 1839, an enthusiastic review by Schumann of the second book (likely Nos. 6–12) of Thalberg's Op. 26 appeared, concluding "He is a God when sitting at the piano."
First extended tour After Thalberg's "Farewell concert" in Vienna, he began his first extended
European tour. On 19 and 21 December 1838, he gave two concerts in
Dresden, and he performed twice at the Court. Receiving honours from the King of Saxony, he told him, "Wait until you have heard Liszt!" In Leipzig, he gave a concert on 28 December 1838, attended by Mendelssohn, who, on the following day, in a letter to his sister
Fanny, gave an enthusiastic account. Mendelssohn became a friend and admirer of Thalberg. After a second concert in Leipzig on 30 December 1838, Thalberg travelled to
Berlin to give a series of concerts there. Via
Danzig,
Mitau, and other places, he performed at
St. Petersburg, receiving excellent reviews. From St. Petersburg, he went on a steamboat to London, where he gave further concerts. He then journeyed to
Brussels to meet his violinist friend
Charles de Bériot. There, he gave several private performances. After Brussels, Thalberg arrived in the
Rhineland, where he gave a series of concerts with Bériot. He returned to London at the beginning of February 1840, and then travelled from London to Paris together with Baroness Wetzlar, his mother, awaiting the arrival of Liszt.
Interlude Thalberg had already announced in December 1838—during his stay in Leipzig—that he would take time off at the end of his tour, and did not perform at any concert during his stay in spring 1840 in Paris. At this time Mendelssohn, after meeting Liszt, compared him to Thalberg in a letter to his mother:Thalberg, with his composure, and within his more restricted sphere, is more nearly perfect as a real virtuoso; and after all this is the standard by which Liszt must also be judged, for his compositions are inferior to his playing, and, in fact, are calculated solely for virtuosi.After the end of the Parisian concert season, Thalberg travelled as tourist in the Rhineland. In the beginning of June 1840, he attended a music festival directed by
Louis Spohr in
Aachen. He got an invitation from the Russian Tsarina and performed at a court-concert in
Bad Ems, but this was his only concert during his stay in the Rhineland. According to a note in the
Revue et Gazette musicale of 2 August 1840, Bériot would get married two days later in Elsene (
Ixelles). His bride was a young lady, Maria Huber, born in Vienna, from
Germany. She was an orphan and had been adopted by Prince von Dietrichstein, Thalberg's father. It may therefore be presumed that Thalberg wanted to take part in the wedding celebration. During previous visits to the Rhineland, he wanted only to relax. He also taught Bériot's son, the pianist
Charles-Wilfrid de Bériot. In the
Revue et Gazette musicale of 9 May 1841, an essay by
Fétis appeared—
''Études d'exécution transcendente''—in which he praised Liszt for a new composing style which had been stimulated by Thalberg's challenge. In letters to Fétis of 17 May 1841, and to Simon Löwy of 20 May 1841, Liszt agreed with this analysis.
1840–1848 Thalberg performed in Brussels in fall 1840. He then travelled to Frankfurt-am-Main, where he stayed until January 1841. It had been announced that Thalberg would give concerts in Paris again in spring 1841, but he changed his plans. In Frankfurt, he only took part in a charity concert on 15 January 1841, playing his fantasies on
La Donna del Lago and
Les Huguenots. He was busily composing new works; his ''Grande fantaisie sur la Sérénade et le Menuet de '
Don Juan'
, Op. 42 and his Fantasia on Rossini's '
Semiramide''', Op. 51 date from this time. In the second half of January 1841, Thalberg travelled from Frankfurt to
Weimar, where he performed three times at the Grand Duke's court and also in the Theatre. He then went to Leipzig, where he visited Mendelssohn and Schumann. On 8 February 1841, he gave a solo concert in Leipzig, enthusiastically reviewed by Schumann, playing his Op. 42 (
Don Juan); his ''Andante final de '
Lucia di Lammermoor'
, Op. 44; his Theme and Etude
, Op. 45; and his Grand Caprice on
Bellini's '
La Sonnambula''', Op. 46. Clara Schumann (
née Wieck) noted in her diary:On Monday Thalberg visited us and played to the delightment beautiful on my piano. An even more accomplished mechanism than his does not exist, and many of his piano effects must ravish the connoisseurs. He does not fail a single note, his passages can be compared to rows of pearls, his octaves are the most beautiful ones I ever heard.Mendelssohn's student
Horsley wrote of the meeting of his teacher and Thalberg:We were a trio, and after dinner Mendelssohn asked Thalberg if he had written anything new, whereupon Thalberg sat down to the piano and played his Fantasia from the "Sonnambula" . . . At the close there are several runs of Chromatique Octaves, which at that time had not previously heard, and of which peculiar passages Thalberg was undoubtedly the inventor. Mendelssohn was much struck with the novel effect produced, and greatly admired its ingenuity . . . he told me to be with him the next afternoon at 2 o'clock. When I arrived at his study door I heard him playing to himself, and practising continually this passage which had so struck him the previous day. I waited for at least half an hour listening in wonderment to the facility with which he applied his own thoughts to the cleverness of Thalberg's mechanism, and then went into the room. He laughed and said: 'Listen to this, is it not almost like Thalberg?'After his stay in Leipzig, Thalberg gave concerts in
Breslau and
Warsaw. He then travelled to Vienna and gave two successful concerts there. In a review in the
Leipziger Allgemeine musikalische Zeitung, Thalberg was described as Liszt's only rival. In winter 1841–1842, Thalberg gave concerts in Italy, while Liszt, from the end of December 1841 until the beginning of March 1842, gave a series of concerts in Berlin. Thalberg matched Liszt's successes in Berlin. He then returned via
Marseille,
Toulon, and
Dijon, arriving on 11 April 1842, in Paris. On the next day, he gave his first—and on 21 April, his second—concert. According to an account by Berlioz, Thalberg made a profit of 12,000 francs from his first concert, and one of 13,000 francs from his second. The concerts were reviewed in the
Revue et Gazette musicale by
Henri Blanchard who—two years before, in his review of Liszt's concert on 20 April 1840—had nominated Thalberg as
Cesar,
Octavian or Napoleon of the piano. In spring 1842, Blanchard reached for new superlatives, even surpassing his former ones. In his review of Thalberg's second concert, he wrote that Thalberg would in 100 years have been canonized—and by all coming pianists, be invoked with—the name of Holy Thalberg. According to the account by Berlioz, at the end of Thalberg's second concert, a golden crown was thrown onto the stage. In addition to his own concerts, Thalberg took part in a concert of
Émile Prudent. He then travelled via Brussels to London. Later, in 1842, Thalberg was decorated with the Cross of the French
Legion of Honour. He travelled to Vienna, where he stayed until fall 1842. In the second half of November until 12 December 1842, he made a further tour in Great Britain, and in January 1843, he returned to Paris. At the end of March 1843, he performed at a private concert of Pierre Erard (nephew of the piano and harp maker
Sébastien Érard), but this was his only concert appearance during that season.= In March 1843,
Heinrich Heine wrote about Thalberg:His performance is so gentlemanly, so entirely without any forced acting the genius, so entirely without that well-known brashness that makes a poor cover for inner insecurity. Healthy women love him. So do sickly women, even though he does not engage their sympathy by epileptic seizures at the piano, even though he does not play at their overstrung, delicate nerves, even though he neither electrifies them nor galvanizes them.In winter 1843–44, Thalberg gave concerts in Italy again. At the end of March 1844, he returned to Paris, where—at the same time—Liszt was also expected. Liszt arrived on April 8 and gave on 16 April a first concert, at which he played his
Réminiscences de Norma, S. 394, published shortly before. When composing this fantasy, Liszt had put many Thalbergian effects into it. In his later years, he told
August Göllerich, one of his pupils:As I met Thalberg, I said to him: 'Here I have cribbed everything from you.' 'Yes,' he replied, 'there are Thalberg-passages included which are indeed indecent.'Shortly after Liszt's concert on 11 May 1844, Thalberg left Paris. He travelled to London and gave a concert there on 28 May 1844. At a further concert in London, he played a concerto for three pianos by
J. S. Bach together with Moscheles and Mendelssohn. He also took part in a concert of
Julius Benedict. In August 1844, Thalberg returned to Paris, where he stayed until 1845. During the winter 1844–45, he gave a piano course for selected students at the Paris Conservatoire. On April 2, 1845, he gave a concert in Paris, playing his
Fantasia on Rossini's
Barber of Seville, Op. 63; his ''Grande fantaisie sur les motifs de '
Don Pasquale'
, Op. 67; and his Fantasia on
Auber's 'La Muette de Portici'
, Op. 52—as well as his Marche funèbre
, Op. 59 and his Barcarolle'', Op. 60. In spring 1848, in Vienna, Liszt met Thalberg once more. On 3 May 1848, Thalberg gave a benefit concert which Liszt attended. According to an account by his pupil , Liszt was sitting on the stage, carefully listening, and loudly applauding. It had been 11 years since he had first heard his rival's playing. == Concerts in America ==