My 1990 article “Liszt's Années de pèlerinage, Book 3: A ‘Hungarian’ Cycle?” argues that Liszt conceived the Années de pèlerinage: Troisième année as a true cycle, with musical and conceptual links to his homeland Hungary. Années 3 carries us through Liszt's reflections on death via its four threnodies and the consolation he found in Christianity via its three religious pieces. Années 3's multiple references to Hungary's second national anthem “Szózat” suggest that Liszt infused his metaphysical reflections with thoughts of his homeland. Années 3 is further unified through tonal and motivic features.

This essay offers an in-depth interpretation of two of the cycle's threnodies, Aux cyprès de la Villa d’Este 1 and 2 (S. 162/2 and 3 / LW A283/2 and 3, 1877). Liszt's multiple surviving versions of the two works allow me to examine my interpretations against firsthand evidence. My analysis uncovers intersecting concerns on Liszt's part as he revises: how to “work out” each piece's seminal harmonic concept, how to enhance plaintive gestures, and how to bring virtuosic textures into play. With respect to the last, Liszt engages virtuosity in a multifaceted way. As a composer-performer, Liszt desires to “command” his instrument and have those who perform his music do likewise: as virtuosos, they expose the keyboard's sonic potential revealed through diverse textures, whether in lyrical or dramatic passages. Significantly, Liszt's revisions of the two threnodies often increase their sonic exploration of the keyboard not simply for its performative value but also as a vehicle for expression within each piece's overall affective trajectory.

In sum, this chapter proposes to show that the final version of each Cypress piece can be understood in terms of an affective journey. While each threnody evokes a tone of lament, of plaintiveness in its opening motive, neither is limited to a single affect. As Liszt develops a harmonic plan linked in some way to these germinal motives, he also traces an affective trajectory that complicates the lament theme. In Aux cyprès 1, on the one hand, the unstable opening motive yields to a stable lyrical melody. In the quietude of what follows, Liszt offers a glimpse of solace achieved through religious faith, though still tinged with the pain of grief.