This concert features three enchanting works: two of them will take us to Vienna, the third to Paris. Opening the programme will be a short piece, one of the most beautiful waltzes ever written, followed by the piano concerto by Ravel, and closing it will be one of the most important symphonies in the literature of music, a quite lengthy work that includes one of the most popular movements in the symphonic repertoire, which includes a confession of love expressed in musical notes. The French piano concerto being played between the two Viennese works represents the Gallic spirit – but not only that, as the work also owes a great deal to the influence of American jazz.

At this concert, the Hungarian National Philharmonic Orchestra and Zsolt Hamar, its music director since 2017, will welcome one of the most exciting and virtuosic pianists of our time as their guest. Turkish by birth, Fazıl Say has lived in Western Europe for decades and is at home with every style and era of music, imparting a true experience with any work he performs. As the soloist for Ravel’s scintillating and austere Piano Concerto in G major, he is sure to be in his element, as he has treated the Hungarian audience to encores of jazz-infused movements at the end of more than one of his concerts here. The Emperor Waltz by “waltz king” Johann Strauss Jr. is an inimitable bit of Vienna, full of charm, grace, elegance and nobility. Mahler’s Symphony No. 5, completed in 1902 – a mere dozen years after the 1889 waltz – is, like all of the composer’s other efforts in the genre, a dramatic work. It depicts an entire world, leading the listener from a state of mourning to an affirmation of life. Its penultimate movement is the Adagietto, which expresses the composer’s feelings for his wife, Alma Schindler. Played independently, it is a popular encore piece in concert halls. The concert will be conducted by Karen Kamensek, who was introduced to the Hungarian audience to great acclaim at the orchestra’s concert last year.