The 2024 InClassica International Music Festival, organised by SAMIT Event Group, continues on Monday 5th February, as Turkish pianist Fazil Say, a recipient of the Music Prize of the city of Duisburg (2017) and International Beethoven Prize for Human Rights, Peace, Freedom, Poverty Reduction and Inclusion, and four-time ECHO Klassik Award-winner, takes to the stage of Dubai Opera for a classical concert that will also feature the Berlin Symphony Orchestra and Armenian conductor Sergey Smbatyan. The evening will open with Danse Macabre, a legendary tone poem written in 1874 by Camille Saint-Saëns that depicts Death dancing with his various minions on Halloween. Starting its life in 1872 as an art song for voice and piano, the piece would be reworked in 1874, with the vocal line replaced by the solo violin part. Another work by Saint-Saëns will come next, namely his Piano Concerto No. 2 in G minor, an 1868 work that was remarkably written in only three weeks, but which has gone on to become easily one of the composer’s most popular concertos. Following this, Smbatyan and the orchestra will then turn to Johannes Brahms for their final piece, presenting their interpretation of his celebrated Symphony No. 4 in E minor, an 1885 work in four movements that would prove to be the last of the German composer’s symphonies.

The InClassica International Music Festival is a celebration of the very best that the world of classical music has to offer. Featuring world-class concerts with some of the most renowned soloists, orchestras and conductors of our time, the festival boasts a series of richly diverse programmes ranging from seminal favourites all the way up to contemporary masters, promising a momentous two-week event that is sure to be an unforgettable experience for all!