Schubert & Berg: Piano Sonatas

Fazıl Say’s Schubert & Berg: Piano Sonatas is a 2026 Warner Classics release that pairs two very different Viennese works: Schubert’s late Piano Sonata in B‑flat major, D 960, and Alban Berg’s Piano Sonata in B minor, Op. 1. Say presents them as bookends to the Romantic tradition—Schubert’s four‑movement, “heavenly length” masterpiece from 1828 on one side, and Berg’s single‑movement, post‑Wagnerian, proto‑atonal Op. 1 from 1909 on the other—using their contrast to trace how lyricism, harmony, and sonata form evolved across almost a century of Viennese music.

In his own notes, Say hears Schubert’s D 960 as music suffused with both “the pain of parting from this world” and an undimmed joy and defiance, and his interpretation leans into that duality: broad, singing lines, flexible rubato, and a focus on the music’s quiet, introspective undercurrent rather than sheer power. By contrast, Berg’s Op. 1 is treated as a compact dramatic “scene”—almost a mini‑opera for solo piano—anchored nominally in B minor but constantly slipping toward atonality, with Say exploiting its orchestral textures and waves of colour. The album thus functions as both a showcase for his highly personal pianism—often compared to Glenn Gould for its individuality—and as a tightly focused program essay on Viennese modernism’s roots in late Romantic expressivity.