The 23-year-old Fülöp Ránki, the soloist for the concert to open the Hungarian National Philharmonic's season, will play Béla Bartók's Piano Concerto No. 1 on an evening to mark the 73rd anniversary of the composer's death. The world premiere took place in Frankfurt on 1 July 1927 under the baton of Wilhelm Furtwängler and featuring the composer himself. The piece was first heard in Budapest on 18 March 1928, with Bartók once again performing the solo and Ernő Dohnányi conducting the Budapest Philharmonic Orchestra.
In this concerto, the orchestra and the piano operate as one, playing in unison almost without pause as they share motifs and pass the initiative back and forth. The work can only be performed by musicians blessed with both the technical ability and wild temperament needed to conquer the solo, which even Bartók admitted is fiendishly difficult. Fülöp Ránki, who was born in 1995 and has been playing Bartók's Piano Concerto No.1 since he was 18, is a musician who possesses these qualities. After performing alongside Ránki, Zoltán Kocsis commented that 'Fülöp plays the hardest, most challenging and technically most demanding pieces... Of all the soloists I've accompanied to date, Fülöp is probably the easiest to play with.'

Presented by: Hungarian National Philharmonic