What did this past year look like for you after winning the "Heirs of Musical Romania" scholarship?

I focused more on a thorough and introspective study, with a lot of chamber concerts, various private events, but I consider that after such a period of time I need to get out more, to come up to the surface, and to be on bigger stages in Romania. Therefore, I am eager for these concerts.

What do you like about Olivier Messiaen's music? Is it the sonorities which you have talked about before?

Yes. Even if "Le baiser de l'Enfant Jésus" is the work with which I will finish my recital, the first draftsof the repertoire began with Messiaen, a composer whose music I had the opportunity to deeply study at the Royal Academy in London under the guidance of Professor Joanna MacGregor, who is one of the few specialists in Messiaen's music. And I add the fact that I began with a religious, spiritual theme, which includes nature, birds' songs, things which fascinated Messiaen, as he was also an ornithologist.

Messiaen's music is deeply rooted in his catholic faith and his contemplations upon Christ. These aspects fascinate me as well and I agree - even if I'm an orthodox - with the religious themes, which I am also interested in in my everyday life. In Messiaen's music we see a lot further than the materialistic world. We begin to contemplate upon some more abstract ideas.

The entire "Vingt regards" cycle is almost a massive work, unabashed in its overflow of energy and colour, full of sonorities coloured by intellectually rigorous ideas; each piece of the cycle is in its own sense a contemplation on a theological aspect of Messiaen's Catholic faith.

However, the contemplations are carefully dramatically paced and can be either serene, fierce, slow, rigidly doctrinaire or even funny. I even want to mention a couple of technical elements that I find very interesting in his compositional style, which although they might sound quite abstract at first, these elements make a lot of sense and architectural sense. For example, in the sixth piece of the "Vingt regards" cycle, Par Lui tout a étéfait, in which the construction of an extraordinarily dense and complex fugue after nine pages begins to unfold in reverse, like a colossal piece of engineering.

Let's go back in time to your childhood. What was it like for you to be part of a family of artists and musicians?

It was quite special. Since I was little, I was surrounded by paints, brushes, colours and this artistic taste that was instilled in me and I started to think in a more artistic way. And indeed, not only did I become a musician, I'm a pianist, but I'm also a visual artist - I paint and express myself very much every moment of the day in an artistic way.

I have three other brothers, also artists, and I'm glad that we all collaborate, communicate, support each other and can even create wonderful projects together. And I hope that more and more family projects will materialize in the future.