This programme takes its title from its use of no more than four instruments, along with electronics (here mostly as cases of ‘tape’), as the wildcard ‘Fifth Element’, designed to specifically to complement the theatre-like ambience of the Akbank venue. The first half of our programme features short, yet key works of Karen Tanaka, Franghez Ali-Zadeh, Ed Bennett and Jonathan Harvey in which electronics plays a key role.  Post-intermission, Hezarfen Ensemble gives the Turkish Premiere of Steve Reich’s seminal ‘Different Trains’(1988), a memorium on one hand to the composers’ cross country journeys in the USA during his childhood to visit family, combined with the reflection that, as a Jew, had he been in Europe during this same period he would have been riding very ‘Different Trains.’  The piece’s powerful statement builds up in close consultation with the recorded text, which begins and ends ‘from Chicago’ before and after the war, reaching the sirens of Auschwitz in its understated, yet harrowing centre. Hezarfen is proud to perform this cornerstone work of contemporary music for its Turkish premiere.