In Memoriam Haydée

Games and Transcriptions for piano solo and four hands', this is a film, directed by Isabelle Soulard, of a Kurtág concert at Paris's Cité de la Musique. The duo performances of Márta and György Kurtág are distinguished by tough new music precision, underpinned by a quality of affection ("What playing!" raved the New Yorker of a Játékok concert. "Notes were placed with surgical care; inner voices gleamed in crystalline patterns; elusive emotional states were painted with quick, light strokes.") Játékok has become a compendium of tiny homages, jewelled miniatures dedicated to composers from Scarlatti to Stravinsky and tributes to colleagues and influences. In this special case the whole programme is dedicated to the memory of the Kurtágs' good friend, musicologist Haydée Charbagi (1979-2008). Interspersed amongst the Játékok pieces are György Kurtág's Bach transcriptions. The whole programme closes with a beautiful version of 'Gottes Zeit ist die allerbeste Zeit'.