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The MS of Wilde Jagd: Scherzo is dated Eilsen, second week of January 1851. Although it is clearly an earlier version of the Scherzo und Marsch, it is a rather longer piece. The MS shows a number of later alterations in preparation for the published work, but these have been ignored here in order to present the complete original text. In any case, there must have been a definitive MS of the Scherzo und Marsch (whereabouts presently unknown) containing all of the alterations merely commenced in the present work. The first part of the title (‘Wild Hunt’) was, of course, transferred by Liszt later in 1851 to the eighth of the Études d’exécution transcendante. It is not clear when the few extra bars at the coda (the final flourish) were added—they are not the same as those in the later version, so they are included here. The piece was published for the first time in the Liszt Society Journal in 2009.

from notes by Leslie Howard © 2011