Good Composer Gone Bad

In college, I studied Liszt's tone poem Mazeppa. I'm not talking about the Transcendental Etude, which is find. When he tried to extend it by ten minutes, however, and orchestrated it, it fell flat. I have never been able to listen to it without laughing -- at the clunkiness of the form, the poor over-worked horse galloping through the strings, the pathetic sighs when the winds take the melody over from the brass (for that matter, the melody itself, with that high e that gets me every time), and the dead stop before the sudden, inexplicably happy ending.

Now, don't get me wrong, I love Liszt. His sonata is a masterpiece, I listen to his transcription of the Tannhauser overture more often than I listen to Wagner's original, and I'm a fan of the Faust Symphony.

But Mazeppa is just a dreadful piece. Yet, it's recorded again and again. (Tower Records online has 14 recordings of the orchestral version.)

There's so much great music out there that hasn't been recorded, or not enough. Why anyone wastes their time on Mazeppa is beyond me.