The interesting thing about Richard Wagner, as far as the piano goes,
is that he didn't compose any music for the piano other than a few
student pieces in 1831.  (His last work, Parsifal, was premiered in
1882).  Yet it was on the piano that the vast majority of people heard
his music, predominantly in the arrangements done by Franz Liszt.  With
no recording industry, and opera houses rather inaccessible, there was
no other way to hear the music.

Wagner's relationship, musical and personal, with Liszt is a
fascinating story.  Wagner's music was heavily influenced by Liszt,
although this was downplayed later by Wagner (who cultivated his image
carefully) and is generally ignored today.

Liszt chose to arrange for piano works of promising composers he felt
deserved a wider audience, and he took a great fancy to Wagner.  This
started with his transcribing the Tannhauser overture in 1848 and
continued right up to his death in 1886 (visiting Wagner's opera house
in Bayreuth).

Humphrey Searle's book "The music of Liszt" (Dover, 1966, and still in
print) is invaluable as an overview.  He points out that the chromatic
harmony in Tristan (as so fascinatingly discussed by Nathan Bello in
MMD 020426) owes much to Liszt, citing "Il Pensoroso" from Annees de
Pelerinage, book 2, which is fully 20 years earlier than Tristan.
Wagner's use of the ideas was different, and later Liszt works show
that ideas flowed each way.

Piano rolls of the Wagner-Liszt transcriptions are fairly common and
are well worth collecting.  It's also well worth looking out for the
more complex Liszt compositions, overshadowed as they are by vast
numbers of flashy but less interesting Hungarian Rhapsodies!  Armed
with the Searle book I have been picking up the better-regarded items
when they turn up, making a fun (and cheap) collecting sideline and
presenting a real musical challenge to learn to play them properly.

There's plenty of Wagner on piano rolls to collect.  The 1914 UK
Themodist catalogue has no less than 192 rolls of Wagner's music (some
of them variant productions from the same master roll), many available
on plain 65-note, 65-note with Themodist and/or Metrostyle, or 88-note
rolls.  The rolls range from wholesale chunks of operas (12 rolls of
Parsifal, 17 rolls of Tannhauser) to rarities such as Wagner's piano
sonata.  There are 292 rolls of Liszt, half originals and half
arrangements.

Julian Dyer

P.S.: I'm still looking for Liszt's "Ricordanza" if anyone has a spare!