Légende No. 1: St François d'Assise, S.175/1, was written around 1863 by Franz Liszt

Franz Liszt

Franz Liszt ; ), was a 19th-century Hungarian composer, pianist, conductor, and teacher.Liszt became renowned in Europe during the nineteenth century for his virtuosic skill as a pianist. He was said by his contemporaries to have been the most technically advanced pianist of his age...

 during his time at an abbey. It is based on the religious story of St Francis of Assisi

Francis of Assisi

Saint Francis of Assisi was an Italian Catholic friar and preacher. He founded the men's Franciscan Order, the women’s Order of St. Clare, and the lay Third Order of Saint Francis. St...

, who preached to the birds. It was mentioned in the first part of Marcel Proust's À la recherche du temps perdu.

Form

This song mostly relies on the higher quarter of the keyboard, grace notes, trills, and thirds, though there is a chorale-like theme in the middle. Some of the difficulties in this song include switching trills between the left and right hand, quick thirds, arpeggios and switching to play a set of semi-quavers between the left and right hand.