The present volume derives in large part from a conference held at the Eastman School of Music (University of Rochester) on March 2–4, 2017, entitled “Liszt and Virtuosity—an International Symposium,” organized by Jonathan Dunsby, Ralph P. Locke, and me. All of the essays contained herein have been rewritten or extensively revised and lengthened; a few were newly commissioned specifically for this volume. Unfortunately, Alexander Stefaniak's and Dana Gooley's papers were unable to be included due to their having been promised elsewhere. Rena Charnin Mueller, another participant, was unable to revise and submit her paper due to illness.

The book's division into three parts reflects the contributors’ principal areas of interest with respect to Lisztian virtuosity and to virtuosity more generally: (1) how Lisztian virtuosity relates to performance practices, (2) the theoretical or conceptual aspects of virtuosity as manifested in Liszt's example, and (3) the role of virtuosity or anti-virtuosity in Liszt's late works. My editor's introduction offers a broad overview of the subject of virtuosity and of Liszt's essential relation to it, along with some consideration of the major questions and problems involved in its treatment. Although it does not summarize the individual contributions made in each of the book's chapters, it refers to all of them in passing, thereby setting them in the context of larger trends within the fields of historical musicology, music theory and analysis, intellectual history, and performance studies.

The idea of virtuosity has become topical in music studies only relatively recently, reflecting a broad reappraisal of this long-undervalued aspect of music. Volumes devoted to it during just the past few years include the collection Exploring Virtuosities: Heinrich Wilhelm Ernst, Nineteenth- Century Musical Practices and Beyond (2018), a special issue of the journal Musicae Scientiae titled “Virtuosity” (2018), and several monographs: Hyun Joo Kim, Liszt's Representation of Instrumental Sounds on the Piano: Colors in Black and White (University of Rochester Press, 2019); Alexander Stefaniak, Schumann's Virtuosity: Criticism, Composition, and Performance in Nineteenth-Century Germany (2016); Žarko Cvejić, The Virtuoso as Subject: The Reception of Instrumental Virtuosity, c. 1815–c. 1850 (2016); and Mai Kawabata, Paganini: The “Demonic” Virtuoso (2013).