Otto Gumprecht of the ‘Nationalzeitung’ called the Sonata ‘an invitation to hissing and
stomping of feet.’ Oscar Eichberg, however, showed some enthusiasm in the ‘Neuer
Berliner Musikzeitung’.
Gustav Engel wrote in the ‘Spener’schen Zeitung’ of 30 January 1857:
‘The second item in the concert was a Sonata by Liszt (B minor). It has the peculiarity of
consisting of a single very extended movement. Certain main themes form the basis of
the whole. Among them, the first is of such a quality that one can almost discern the
character of the work by it alone. The structure rests on harmonic and rhythmic effusions
that have not the slightest connection with beauty. Even the first theme must be
dismissed as completely inartistic. Admittedly, what we get during the development is
worse.
Engel concludes that ‘it is scarcely possible to be further away from legitimate
procedures than is the case here.’
Following Engel’s scathing review, Bülow, quite understandably upset, wrote to the
‘Spener’schen Zeitung’ thus commencing an acrimonious correspondence. Liszt tried to
calm down his highly-strung virtuoso friend:
‘I can only adopt a certain degree of passive curiosity, continuing along my path of
creating new works, without being troubled by the barking or the biting.’
Later in 1857, when Bülow was invited to give a recital in Leipzig, he offered the
committee Beethoven’s ‘Diabelli’ Variations and Liszt’s Sonata. Ferdinand David
replied, asking him to drop the Sonata on the stated grounds that the low fee of six louis
d’or did not give the organisers the right to ask for Liszt, only Bach and Beethoven.
‘People have heard that you play the things of your master in public, show them that you
understand no less the works of the older masters.’
Bulow was understandably stung by the gratuitous offensiveness of the reply including
the description of the Sonata as a ‘thing’.
He persevered with the Liszt Sonata, however, playing it three times in public, in Berlin
and Leipzig, between 1857 and 1861. Bulow never issued an edition of the Liszt Sonata
although he did issue an edition, which Liszt warmly praised, of the Beethoven Sonatas.
Bukow did not survive into the disc recording age.
Peter Cornelius was another supporter of the Sonata. He planned to devote a lecture to it
in Vienna in 1859 as part of a series of three lectures, the other two dealing with
Beethoven’s ‘Hammerklavier’ Sonata and Schumann’s F sharp minor Sonata. Cornelius
discussed his views on the Liszt Sonata with the composer but none of the lectures in fact
took place because after researching the topic Cornelius felt he could not do justice to it.