The Turkish top pianist Fazıl Say gives Mozart’s works a personal twist in his Mozart-Say Suite. The Ukrainian composer Sylvestrov likewise pays tribute to Mozart with The Messenger, while Schnittke evokes the spirits of the old masters Mozart and Haydn.
Mozart is revered in the programme Mozart à la Say. The internationally celebrated pianist and composer Fazıl Say is a great fan of the Classical giant, but adds his personal touch to the master’s work. The three movements from Mozart’s Serenata Notturna and Fantasia, and piano works by Say are combined together to create a “Mozart-Say Suite”. The Messenger by the Ukrainian composer Valentin Sylvestrov is a melancholic but at the same time optimistically hopeful work that pays tribute to the great classical master. In the score the messenger is expressed in flowing, distantly sounding Mozartian phrases.
In Moz-Art à la Haydn, Schnittke evokes the spirits of the old masters Mozart and Haydn. They play a grizzly but ironic duel with fragments of classical music. The closing work Yürüyen Köşk (The Moving Mansion) by Fazıl Say is an ode to the Turkish folk hero Atatürk. Originally a piano quintet, this work is now performed by full string orchestra.
A quarter of a century later, Fazıl Say still touches his audience right in the heart, his work is direct, open and riveting.”
– composer Albert Reinmann