Interestingly, the phenomenon of musical superstars goes as far back as the 1840s. This was before the radio was invented in 1894 and definitely before the radio was popularized.

Before I get into the subject, I must explain a little bit about romanticism. Typically defined as a reaction to the cold and calculating sciene of the Enlightenment, the Romantic movement in first half of the 1800s generally heavily emphasized emotion, Medieval art, an appreciation for nature, and gothic themes. While more prominent in the world of literature and painting, romanticism also led to revolutionary musical techniques. Classical music is often thrown together into one genre by modern people, but it is a highly nuanced genre with many distinct subgenres.

Enter Franz Liszt. Born in Austria in 1811, Liszt’s father began to teach him to play piano at age 7. By age 8 Liszt was already composing music and at age 9 was playing in concerts. After noticing his skill at one of these concerts, wealthy individuals approached Liszt and offered him patronage, including professional music education in Vienna. Accepting their offer, Liszt soon found himself learning from Carl Czerny, a student of Beethoven. After his father’s death in 1827, Liszt gave up touring Europe and for five years became a teacher of music in Paris. In 1832 he attended a charity concert put on by the extremely talented violinist Niccolo Paganini. Throwing himself back into composing, Liszt was determined to become as good on the piano as Paganini was on the violin. In 1839, Liszt began an 8 year musical tour of Europe.

The concert going public loved Liszt and his use of innovative romantic musical techniques. Of his performances, in 1840 Hans Christian Anderson said, “When Liszt entered the saloon, it was as if an electric shock passed through it…the whole of Liszt’s exterior and movements reveal one of those persons we remark for their peculiarities alone; the Divine hand has placed a mark on them which makes them observable among thousands.” and Robert Schumann, also in 1840, said Liszt was an expert in “subjugating, elevating, and leading the public [who were] overwhelmed by a flood of tones and feelings.” During concerts women fainted and screamed, people stormed the stage to take his personal objects like gloves or handkerchiefs, and take bits of his hair. Fans collected his old piano strings as bracelets, saved his last drops of coffee in glass vials, and one particularly avid fan took one of his used cigars out of the gutter to put in a diamond locket she wore regularly. It is hard to downplay the obsession of his fans. They were known as extremely boisterous, and the descriptions of their behavior very much calls to mind the Beatlemania of the 1960s. Fittingly, newspapers at the time called this phenomenon ‘Lisztomania.’