Kopatchinskaja and Say explore the violin’s expressive range on new album
Violinist Patricia Kopatchinskaja and pianist Fazil Say’s new album pairs music by both performers with works by Szymanowski and Prokofiev. The recording matters for the way its varied pieces explore the violin’s expressive range, with Kopatchinskaja shaping the performances as vivid musical stories.
Say’s *Lost Screams Sonata* combines driving piano rhythms with ghostly violin harmonics and softly plucked piano strings, while Kopatchinskaja’s three-movement *UniSolo* brings playful, searching contrasts. Their works frame a delicate, haunting account of Szymanowski’s *Mythes*; in Prokofiev’s wartime Violin Sonata No 1, Kopatchinskaja sometimes uses a deliberately rough-edged tone rather than a heroic one. Across the album, both musicians test the instrument’s boundaries.
- Kopatchinskaja and Say pair their own music with Szymanowski and Prokofiev.
- The album moves between playful invention and haunting delicacy.
- Kopatchinskaja gives Prokofiev’s sonata a strikingly rough-edged voice.
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The violin can sound very different depending on how it is played, from smooth and lyrical to rough, fragile or sharply rhythmic. Patricia Kopatchinskaja is a violinist known for shaping music with a wide range of tones, while Fazil Say is a pianist and composer.
Their album brings together new pieces by Say and Kopatchinskaja with music by Polish composer Karol Szymanowski and Russian composer Sergei Prokofiev. The works include Szymanowski’s Mythes and Prokofiev’s First Violin Sonata, written during the Second World War.
The pairing gives listeners a way to hear how composers and performers use the violin to create contrasting moods and characters. It also places the musicians’ own compositions alongside works from the violin repertoire, showing different approaches to the instrument across time.
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Originally published by The Guardian as “PatKop & Say album review – playfulness and beguiling delicacy in mix of new and old”.