Travel Reference
In-Depth Information
and the return of his body in 1988 occasioned national celebrations, shrewdly sponsored by
the state.
Kodály's music is more consciously national: Bartók called it “a real profession of faith in
the Hungarian soul”. His
Peacock Variations
are based on a typical Old Style pentatonic tune
and the
Dances of Galanta
on the popular music played by Gypsy bands. Old Style tunes also
form the core of Kodály's work in musical education: the “Kodály method” employs group
singing to develop musical skill at an early age. His ideas made Hungarian music teaching
among the best in the world.
The classical tradition was continued by a two of the leading avant-garde composers of the
late twentieth century,
GyörgyLigeti
and
GyörgyKurtág
. Both were born in Transylvania,
and both were strongly influenced by their time in the west in the late 1950s. Ligeti never
returned, and completely embraced the experimental techniques around him, while Kurtág
returned to Budapest to develop his very individual style that retains a strong Bartokian in-
fluence.
Folk music
Hungarianfolkmusic
(
Magyar népzene
) originated around the Urals and the Turkic steppes
over a millennium ago, and is different again from Gypsy or Roma music. The haunting
rhythms and pentatonic scale of this “Old Style” music (to use Bartók's terminology) were
subsequently overlaid by “New Style” European influences - which have been discarded by
more modern enthusiasts in the folk revival centred around Táncház.
The “Dance House” movement was born in the 1970s when folk musicians in Budapest
began to recreate the rural dance gatherings that were still part of everyday life in Hungarian
villages in Transylvania. It struck a chord with the urban middle classes, who were left cold
by the official version of Hungarian folk music industry and attracted by the forbidden fruits
of Hungarian culture. Official disapproval (the dance houses were tolerated but were care-
fully monitored by the authorities) lent them an underground thrill: their popularity spread -
the musicians noted that even the police informers couldn't resist joining in. Since then, the
shouting, whistling, and slapping of boots and thighs has continued unabated, and has man-
aged to survive the official embrace that the Fidesz government has predictably flung round
the folk movement - folk now has its own kitsch talent show
Fölszállt a Páva
.
The two biggest names to emerge from the Táncház movement were
Muzsikás
and
Márta
Sebestyén
, who have been regular collaborators for years. A four-piece ensemble comprising
bass, violin and flute, Muzsikás (pronounced
Mu-zhi-kash
) started out in the early 1970s by
exploring the musical archives of village folk music, from which they derived their own dis-
tinctive repertoire, combining traditional Hungarian music with the sounds of Transylvania,
across the border in Romania - while their recorded output is not that prolific, they do tour
regularly, both at home and abroad.
