Say, Fazil
(1970–)

Fazil Say is a world-renowned Turkish-born, German-trained pianist and performer whose artistry stretches from chamber music to jazz. Recognized as one of the greatest artists of the twenty-first century, Say is not simply a pianist of genius, but also a master composer and improviser. His virtuosity brings innovation to the music landscape of our time, and he receives much adulation from his worldwide audiences. Say performs both classical music and jazz around the globe and is also known for his unique talent to merge in his compositions West and East.

PERSONAL HISTORY

Say was born on 14 January 1970 in Ankara, Turkey. Say is the only child in his family. His father, Ahmet Say, is a music critic who publishes music encyclopedias, and his mother, Güngür Özsoyeller, is a pharmacist. Say's music career began rather by coincidence. Born with a cleft lip and palate, Say underwent many

surgeries during his early childhood. To speed up the healing process, doctors recommended to his parents that Say should play a blowing instrument. This would help his palate close properly and improve his speaking ability. Following this recommendation, Say began playing the flute at three.

Say was a child prodigy. The first melody he tried to imitate was the main theme of a symphony that he heard from one of his father's records. At four, he could multiply four-digit numbers and was able to memorize the musical themes that he had heard. His early music education began at three. With Ali Kemal Kaya, he began rhythmic gymnastics and received music drills to refine his hearing abilities. At four, he became a private student of Mithat Fenmen, a famous Turkish pianist, composer, and music teacher who had studied under Nadia Boulanger and Alfred Cortot. Fenmen was the first to be involved in Say's piano education and teach him how to read notes. Say began playing the piano in 1975 at five, the year his parents divorced. At six and seven, he began reading biographies of composers that inspired him to become a composer, a dream that he has followed passionately. (Zaman, 10 March 2002)

At twelve, Say joined the Ankara State Conservatory where he began his studies in piano and composition. He finished the conservatory, normally a nine-year program, in five years. During this time, he also developed his improvisational skills, improved his techniques through his studies with Kamuran Gündemir, learned composition from Ilhan Baran, and extended his knowledge on contemporary music through his lessons with Ertuğrul Oğuz Firat. Soon piano became his main passion. Ten to fifteen hours a day, he practiced the music by the classical masters and created his own compositions.

He won a scholarship from the Robert Schumann Institute and went to Düsseldorf, Germany, at seventeen. At this time he also wanted to become a soccer player. At nineteen, he became very depressed when his teacher, David Levine, was hospitalized because of AIDS and could not give lessons for a year. Say did not play the piano for one year. As the musician expressed in an interview:

Then, one night I heard the Rite of Spring on the radio, and it touched me very, very deeply—as Stravinsky himself said, it is about the relationship between humans and the earth. The next morning, I decided to begin piano playing again with that piece, and I found the four-hand version and practiced the bass part. When Mr. Levine came out of the hospital, I told him I was playing the piano again and I asked him to play the piece with me. He agreed, and we actually played it together in a couple of concerts in Germany. (Barnes & Noble, 1 April 2001)

His studies with David Levine ended after five years, and Say went to teach at the Berlin Conservatory for three years. During this time, he also composed a piano concerto, one symphony, fifteen chamber music pieces, and thirty songs.

After winning the Young Concert Artists International Auditions, he moved to New York. This award changed his life, launching his international career and making him a star like Emanuel Ax, Murray Perahia, and Pinchas Zukerman—all past winners of the Young Concert Artists International Audition. In 1996 he toured in Europe and the United States and gave forty concerts within six months.

BIOGRAPHICAL HIGHLIGHTS

Name: Fazil Say

Birth: 1970, Ankara, Turkey

Family: Separated. Former wife, Gülyar; one daughter, Kumru (b. 2000)

Nationality: Turkish

Education: Ankara State Conservatory; Robert Schumann Institute, Düsseldorf, Germany, 1987–1992; Berlin Conservatory, 1992–1995

PERSONAL CHRONOLOGY:

• 1994: Winner of Young Concert Artists International Auditions
• 1998: Releases first Mozart disc
• 2001: Echo-Preis Klassik Award and German Music Critics' Best Recording of the Year Award
• 2005: Releases first sound track for the film Ultima Thule by Swiss director Hans-Ulrich Schlumpf
• 2006: Signs exclusive and unlimited contract with Shott Music Publishers Mainz

Since then Say has continued to perform constantly. He gives approximately 120 concerts a year, traveling between Europe, America, and Japan. He performs in the world's leading concert halls including Carnegie Hall and Avery Fischer Hall in New York, the Berlin Philharmonie, the Vienna Musikverein, the Concertgebouw in Amsterdam, and the Suntory Hall in Tokyo. He regularly performs with the New York Philharmonic, the BBC Philharmonic, the Baltimore Symphony, the Israel Philharmonic, the St. Petersburg Philharmonic, the Orchestre National de France, and other famous orchestras across the world. He has appeared at many festivals such as the Montpellier Festival, the Ruhr Piano Festival, the Lucerne Festival, the Beethoven Festival Bonn, and the Verbier Festival.

While music plays a major role in his life, his private life has suffered much from this hectic lifestyle. The rapid advance of his career, the commitments to tours and concerts, and the tough competition in the music scene affected his marriage. Say married his childhood love Gülyar at twenty-seven after knowing her for eleven years and studying together at the Ankara Conservatory. Their daughter, Kumru, was born in 2000, and the couple separated after five years of marriage in 2002. Although Say's residence was in New York, he settled in Turkey after his daughter was born. She accompanies her father on his concert tours around the world.

INFLUENCES AND CONTRIBUTIONS

Audiences and music critics applaud Say's extraordinary virtuosity, as well as the freshness and vitality with which he has improvised classical masterpieces and given them different nuances. Most impressive is the way that he has created his own style, tempos, and the versions of classical music that give his work a specific texture. Say has a deep attachment to the music of Bach, Mozart, and Stravinsky. He also is influenced by the Turkish folk songs of Așik Veysel. The Turkish classical music of composer Dede Efendi inspired Say to connect the old and new world, the West with the East. His admiration for Mozart led Say to write a book on him. In Uçak Notlari (Airplane Notes—Gedanken zur Musik) (1999) Say discussed the influences of Turkish elements on Viennese culture and Western music. The so-called "Alla Turca" motifs ultimately inspired the German composer to create his famous sonata Rondo Alla Turca and his opera The Abduction from the Seraglio.

Similar to Mozart, Say is interested to bend the limiting and restrictive boundaries of music, to break out of compartmentalization. Turkish tunes cannot be played with the piano as it is a tempera instrument consisting of twelve notes, while Turkish music is composed by a system of twenty-four notes. Say has found a solution for this dilemma and argued that although melodies of East and West are separated, they create a harmony when used properly. He weaves motifs from Turkish folk music with Western music, providing a new texture to music and sound. Say also points out that although he is trained in Western classical music, his heart belongs to Anatolia. His Turkish identity and nostalgia about Anatolian culture add emotion into his improvisations that influence Say's repertoire. This experience shapes also the theme of the 'Worldjazz' quartet that Say founded with the Turkish virtuoso, Kudsi Ergüner.

At sixteen he wrote Black Hymns. In his twenties, Say had signed a contract with Atlantic Records and his first recording was a dedication to Bach and Mozart; his second featured performances with the New York Philharmonic of Gershwin's I Got Rhythm Variations and Rhapsody in Blue. There are unlimited recordings of the standard repertory, but what makes Say's music special are his "special effects." He uses overdubbing, a computer-controlled Bösendorfer piano, and special microphone placements as musical devices to add color, texture, and vibrant dimensions to his recordings.

At twenty-one he staged his Concerto for Piano and Violin with the Berliner Symphoniker, and he premiered his second concerto, Silk Road, five years later in Boston. This music describes exotic caravans and is linked by loud strikes on a large Chinese tam tam. In 2001, he premiered his oratorio, Nazim, dedicated to the famous Turkish poet Nazim Hikmet and commissioned by the Turkish Ministry of Culture, to a mesmerized audience. He received great public acclaim when he performed the world premiere of his Piano Concerto no. 3 in Paris in 2002. At the Istanbul Festival in 2003, he presented in a concert of five thousand people his oratorio, Requiem for Metin Altiok. His Fourth Piano Concerto was presented in 2005 in Lucerne. Radio France appointed Say Artist in Residence in 2003. He holds the same position at the Bremen Festival in 2005. A DVD production with the title, Nazim, was released in 2005 covering Say's work for chorus and orchestra.

THE WORLD'S PERSPECTIVE

With the release of his first recording of Mozart pieces, Say received high praise in press reviews. He has won many international awards for his recordings and is celebrated in the West. He stands out because of the originality and quality he brings to classical masterpieces. The artist expresses his thoughts regarding his personality as follows:

Whether in Carnegie Hall or a little Turkish village it's the quality of the music which counts; my wish is to bring the score to life, and whereas my Ottoman heritage certainly influences my own compositions, I sincerely hope I don't play Schumann's trout with overtones of traditional Turkish music! But since I left Turkey many years ago, I don't really know whether I'm a Western musician trying to go from West to East, or a Turkish interpreter trying to make a bridge to Western music. What is important however is to understand the mind of the composer I'm playing. (Culture Kiosque, 19 May 2003)

LEGACY

Say's incredible talents as a pianist, composer, and recording artist have won him many prestigious awards and the recognition of international audiences. His style and ideas give well-known arrangements new and exciting sounds and harmonies. Music critics are puzzled to find words to praise Say's talent and achievements. The terminology varies from "brilliant," "magician," to "Protégé," and "Wonderboy," a characterization by the German newspaper, Die Welt. Music halls are packed by thousands of fans to listen to Say's new works and his interpretations of the masters. As Brooke Edge notes, "Say likes to play the music that inspires him and play it as he feels it. The way it comes through his fingers has been universally acknowledged as filled with fantastic talent, but his occasional deviances from traditional renditions have sometimes ruffled the feathers and fur coats of classical music purists." (Prague Post, 7 February 2007). Say has an obsession to perform live, desiring to present to as many audiences as possible.

In 2005, the Franco-German television station ARTE produced a documentary that provides a portrait of the artist. Gösta Courcamp's Alla Turca follows the pianist and composer on a concert tour to Istanbul, Aspendos, Munich, and other cities. The French newspaper Le Figaro gave the following description about the artist: "He is not merely a pianist of genious; undoubtedly he will be one of the great artists of the twenty-first century." (Prague Post, 7 February 2007).

BIBLIOGRAPHY

Akman, Nuriye. "Fazil Say: Piyano benim vatanım." Zaman. 10 March 2002. Available at http://arsiv.zaman.com.tr/2002/03/10/roportaj/default.htm.

Boccadoro, Patricia. "Interview: Fazil Say." Culture Kiosque. 19 May 2003. Available at http://www.culturekiosque.com/klassik/intervie/fazilsay.htm.

Edge, Brooke. "Steaming up the Keyboard: Fazil Say Takes his Own Approach to the Classics." Prague Post. 7 February 2007. Available at http://www.praguepost.com/articles/2007/02/07/steaming-up-the-keyboard.php.

Farach-Colton, Andrew. "Fazil Say's Rite of Passage: The Young Pianist Tackles a Handful of Stravinsky." Barnes and Noble. 1 April 2001. Available at http://music.barnesandnoble.com.

Leyla, Umar. "Orhan Pamuk'a haksizlik yapildi." Vatan. 12 January 2006. Available at http://www.gazetevatan.com.

                                                  Mine Eren

YOUR JOURNEY IS LONG AFTER IT PASSES THE KEYS

Who told you that the key pads of a piano are black and white? The keys do not even represent the first two meters of a two square kilometer long bridge. The key connects to sound, the sound to the ear. From our hearing it connects to our feelings, senses, perception. Your journey is long after it passes the keys. Let the keys remain black and white so that the rest of the journey divides itself into all the possible colors.

                                            ZAMAN, 10 MARCH 2002.