The panel exhibition In the Footsteps of Franz Liszt: Géza Hegyei, Pianist at the Ottoman Court, and the Stage of Istanbul’s Teutonia Club was created as part of the Turkish–Hungarian Cultural Season, in collaboration with the Liszt Ferenc Academy of Music, the Yunus Emre Institute in Budapest, and the German and Hungarian cultural centres in Istanbul (the Orient- Institut and the Liszt Institute, respectively).

The exhibition is the result of nearly five years of research by the staff of the Liszt Institute in Istanbul. Among the materials on display are valuable documents from the family archive owned by Károly Aliotti, Géza Hegyei’s grandson.

Born in Óbecse in 1862, Géza Hegyei studied under Henrik Gobbi and Franz Liszt at the Academy of Music in Budapest. Following a brief career in Hungary, he gave his first concert in Constantinople in 1888. Until his death in 1926, he played a significant role in Turkey’s musical history as a member of the Sultan’s orchestra, piano teacher to members of the imperial family, and one of the founders of the modern Istanbul Conservatory.

First presented in Istanbul in 2023, the exhibition offers an insight into the metropolis’s Western musical life and the history of the Teutonia Club, the venue of Hegyei’s first concert in the city, while guiding visitors through the pianist’s life and career.

Curators: Evren Kutlay, Richard Wittmann, Gábor Fodor