Browse by Label: HUNGAROTON (HUNGARY)

Artist:	AMADINDA PERCUSSION GROUP
Title:	Ragtimes, African Music
Label:	HUNGAROTON (HUNGARY)
Format:	CD
Price:	$17.00
Catalog #:	HUNG 12855CD

1994 release, featuring compositions by István Marta, John Cage, Steve Reich & George Hamilton Green. "The Amadinda Percussion Group, the first professional percussion group in Hungary, was formed in the spring of 1984. The group was formed at a time when a great many questions were being discussed concerning composers and the relationship between modern music and the public ... These were the conditions that helped bring about the formation of the Amadinda Percussion Group with artistic objectives easily comprehended. Firstly, the performance both at home and abroad of pieces by Hungarian composers, together with others not yet known in Hungary, including works ranked abroad today as classics. These prescriptions we have tried to follow while selecting the music for this recording. The ensemble has a serious interest in African folk music and jazz, and in this manner the record came to include the programme often given in concerts. Particularly interesting are the Green ragtimes, which the composer -- himself an outstanding percussionist -- wrote originally for xylophone with piano accompaniment. The version for xylophone and two marimbas was done on the basis of the original. Of the two Hungarian compositions on side one, the piece by Istvan Marta was written for the Amadinda Group. These two pieces, we feel, serve to complete the picture of the first two years of the ensemble which we wanted to present." -- From the liner notes. Tracklist: "Doll's House Story" by István Marta (1985), "Pebble Playing in a Pot" by Laszlo Sary (1978), "Second Construction" by John Cage (1978), "Piano Phase" by Steve Reich (1967), "Traditional African Music", "Log Cabin Blues (Blue Fox Trot)," "Charleston Capers" by George Hamilton Green, "Traditional African Music," and "Jovial Jasper (A Slow Drag)" by George Hamilton Green. Performed by Amadinda Percussion Group (Karoly Bojtos, Zoltan Racz, Zsolt Sarkany, & Zoltan Vaczi) with István Marta (Roland JX-8P synthesizer) and Gyorgy Racz.

Artist:	CAGE, JOHN
Title:	Thirty Pieces, Music For Piano
Label:	HUNGAROTON (HUNGARY)
Format:	CD
Price:	$17.00
Catalog #:	HUNG 12893CD

1987 release. "Thirty Pieces For Five Orchestras" (1981), performed by the Savaria Symphony Orchestra, conducted by László Tihanyi, Dieter Kempe, Zsolt Serei, Katalin Doman, and Mark Foster; musical direction by Péter Eötvös. "Music For Piano" Nos. 4-19, 21-84 (1952-56). (Realization by A. Wilheim). Performed by Zoltán Jeney, András Wilheim, László Vidovszky, László Sary, Barnabás Dukay (pianists). "Hungaroton continues its invaluable Cage series, this time moving away from the percussion works of past volumes. The works presented here make this self-recommending for anyone devoted to this important 20th century thinker/composer."

Artist:	AMADINDA PERCUSSION GROUP
Title:	4'33''
Label:	HUNGAROTON (HUNGARY)
Format:	CD
Price:	$17.00
Catalog #:	HUNG 12991CD

1994 release. "According to Cage, his composition known by the title '4'33' (1952) that can be performed on any instrument for any length of time (the title changing accordingly) is his most significant work ... The present recording to '4'33' recalls the time of its composing, as later Cage lifted the time limits he had imposed on it. Here, we strictly kept to the duration of the first performance, playing the piece in three movements of 30", 2'23" and 1'40" respectively. The movements are joined to each other attacca." --From the liner notes. Includes "Ionisation" by Edgard Varèse; "Toccata" by Carlos Chávez; "4'33", "Amores" & "Third Construction" by John Cage; "Double Music" by John Cage & Lou Harrison. Performed by Amadinda Percussion Group; Zoltán Kocsis (piano); Aurél Holló, Benedek Tóth (percussion). Includes notes in English and Hungarian.

Artist:	OMEGA
Title:	Trombitás Frédi És A Rettenetes Emberek
Label:	HUNGAROTON (HUNGARY)
Format:	CD
Price:	$17.00
Catalog #:	HUNG 17390CD

The first Omega CD, 2003 edition. "Formed in 1962, Omega began releasing singles in 1966 which featured covers of The Rolling Stones, The Hollies and Herman's Hermits as well as their own original material which reflected these and other Western influences. By 1968, they had briefly toured England and released an album on the UK Decca label under the title Omega Red Star From Hungary, which included some of these singles as well as other tracks which were to appear on Trombidas Fredi es Rettenetes Emberek, their first Hungarian release on the government-owned label, Hungaroton. The themes and messages in the songs were typically '60s, about love & peace and had various approaches to the contemporary '60s rock composition, some sounding like Peter, Paul & Mary ('If I Were The Wind') others like early Rolling Stones ('A Girl Hasn't Gone Home') with trippy guitars and the title track even having a ragtime feel with a honky-tonk sounding piano and a horn section. For the most part though, the album is drenched in psychedelia." --Ian Gledhill, Prog Archives

Artist:	OMEGA
Title:	10000 Lepes
Label:	HUNGAROTON (HUNGARY)
Format:	CD
Price:	$17.00
Catalog #:	HUNG 17400CD

2003 reissue of the second album from Omega. "Classic album from this legendary Hungarian band. In order to understand and appreciate what a remarkable achievement this work was when it was recorded in 1968, it is perhaps necessary to briefly examine the constraints and restrictions faced by aspiring pop bands behind the veil of The Iron Curtain during the 1960s. Despite the fact that Hungary was one of the first breakaway satellite countries both socially and economically under Josef Kadar's New Economic Mechanism implemented in 1966, a censorship board known as The Song Committee had been established in order to syphon out any sensitive material which it deemed harmful to or which seeked to undermine the idealogical agenda of the state. This was a good thing and a bad thing for the bands. They could play their rock n'roll music, which in itself was considered to be symbolic of Western capitalistic endeavors, but the lyrical contents were not to cross any fine lines politically. One has to bear in mind that this was the time when The Beatles were singing about a revolution, Bob Dylan was speaking his mind through the rock medium and closer to home in Western Europe, bands like Amon Düül and Floh de Cologne were making political musical statements. It was the '60s man! The themes throughout the album are mostly mystical and full of legend and even if the listener is not familiar with the unique Hungarian language, the music is very moody and appropriate to the individual song concepts. Omega evolved into the biggest rock act to emerge from Eastern Europe ever, recording in English and German, touring Western Europe as well as Japan. Omega broke down barriers long before the Berlin Wall was broken down and for those who want a taste of what was going on behind The Iron Curtain rock-wise, in the 1960s, 10000 Lepes is an interesting and important audio document which reveals the early Omega East meets West rock formula. Vintage Eastern European prog which rocked against the odds that takes the listener into a forbidden place in a dangerous time. Highly recommended for serious students of the prog rock genre." -- Ian Gledhill, Prog Archives

Artist:	REICH, STEVE
Title:	Music For Mallet Instruments Voices & Organ
Label:	HUNGAROTON (HUNGARY)
Format:	CD
Price:	$17.00
Catalog #:	HUNG 31358CD

1995 release. Includes the pieces "Music for Mallet Instruments, Voices and Organ" (1973), "Music for Pieces of Wood" (1973) & "Sextet" (1985). Performed by Amadinda Percussion Group (Károly Bojtos, Zoltan Rácz, Zsolt Sárkány, Zoltán Váczi); Ágnes Dobszay, Erzsébet Hajdu, Zsuzsanna Lukin (voices); Aurél Holló, Tibor Nemes, Balázs Papp, Benedek Tóth (mallet instruments); Béla Faragó (electric organ); Barnabás Dukay (claves); Károly Binder, György Oravecz (piano, synthesizers).

Artist:	CAGE, JOHN
Title:	Works for Percussion, Vol. 2 (1941-1950)
Label:	HUNGAROTON (HUNGARY)
Format:	CD
Price:	$17.00
Catalog #:	HUNG 31845CD

2000 release, 2nd in a series of 4 percussion CDs on Hungaroton. Perfromed by the Amadinda Percussion Group. This CD features many of Cage's most famous and important works, from his peak era: 1941-1950): 'Third Construction' (1941); 'Credo in Us' (1942); 'Imaginary Landscape No. 3' (1942); 'Imaginary Landscape No. 2' (1942); 'The Wonderful Widow of Eighteen Springs' (1942); 'forever and sunsmell' (1942); 'Amores' (1943);
'She Is Asleep' (1943); 'A Flower' (1950).

Artist:	CAGE, JOHN
Title:	Works For Percussion, Vol. 4 (1940-1956)
Label:	HUNGAROTON (HUNGARY)
Format:	CD
Price:	$17.00
Catalog #:	HUNG 31847CD

New 4th volume. Performed by the Amadinda Percussion Group. "'27' 10.554' for a Percussionist is part of a series Cage prepared between 1953 and 1956, referred to in his sketches at the time as 'The ten thousand things'. The idea of the series was that each of the works -- all of which were composed using the same rhythmical structure (which in this case is rather a layout in time, as a regular beat is no longer present in the pieces) could be performed in any combination, and even that some works sectionalized at the relevant structural points might be performed if desired by several performers at the same time. (The possibility of a layered assemblage is the fundamental idea of the series Music for Piano also being written at the same time.) Eventually five of the planned series of works were completed: two compositions for prepared piano, one for string instruments, the percussion composition here recorded and a performance with words. We have no data concerning the performance of the cycle using full forces. (One vocal work and a composition intended for recorded tape remained in sketch form.)"

Artist:	CAGE, JOHN
Title:	Works For Percussion, Vol. 5 (1936-1991)
Label:	HUNGAROTON (HUNGARY)
Format:	CD
Price:	$17.00
Catalog #:	HUNG 31848CD

5th volume. Performed by the Amadinda Percussion Group. "A decade and a half after John Cage's death, his oeuvre still has much to offer in the way of surprise. Cage had always said he was a poor historian when it came to his own works -- and we are only now beginning to understand what exactly he meant by that. When in 1962 he finally found a publisher and set out to draw up a catalog of his works, he created a selection without including every piece in the inventory, but had apparently forgotten about certain pieces whose manuscripts were, for one reason or another, no longer in his possession. He never looked the lost works up in his earlier lists of works and never tried to find them either. Yet the odds of them turning up then were probably higher than today when, more often than not, it is a matter of chance that for example bequests, from dancer or musician contemporaries of Cage, which end up public libraries, are sifted through properly. In the near past, several works by Cage came to light this way; most recently two pieces from the library of Mills College (Oakland, CA) one of whose title even had not been known to scholars. 'Dance Music (for Elfrid Ide)' was composed in 1940 for a dance production completing the studies of Elfride Ide (it received its premiere, and probably its only performance, on May 20, 1940 at Mills College)."

Artist:	CAGE, JOHN
Title:	Works For Percussion Vol. 6 (1975-1991)
Label:	HUNGAROTON (HUNGARY)
Format:	CD
Price:	$19.00
Catalog #:	HUNG 31849CD

Performed by Amadinda Percussion Group. Featured works: Haikai (for eight performers on gamelan degung); Improvisation Ia: Child of Tree (for percussionist using plant materials [with or without amplification], at least one of which is a pod rattle from a Poinciana tree and at least one [preferably several] are cacti); Improvisation Ib: Branches; Five4 (for soprano saxophone in B flat, alto saxophone in E flat and three percussionists); c /Composed Improvisation (for any solo or combination of snare drum, Steinberger bass guitar, and one-sided drums with or without jangles -- version for bass guitar and snare drum); But What About The Noise Of Crumpling Paper Which He Used To Do In Order To Paint The Series Of "Papiers Froissés" or Tearing Up Paper to Make "Papiers déchires"? Arp Was Stimulated by Water (Sea, Lake, and Flowing Waters like Rivers), Forests. (in celebration of the work of Jean Arp on the occasion of the centenary of his birth for three to ten percussionists each using at least two only slightly resonant instruments, also involving water, paper, etc. -- version for ten performers).

Artist:	EAR ENSEMBLE
Title:	Hungarian Live Electronic Works
Label:	HUNGAROTON (HUNGARY)
Format:	CD
Price:	$17.00
Catalog #:	HUNG 31868CD

2000 release. "The present recording contains the works of 7 composers written in quite different stylistic trends. What connects them is that they have all been composed at the request of the Ear group: all were written for the specific apparatus of the group (4-8 instruments and synthesizer/s) between 1992 and 1999 ... the name of the ensemble is the abbreviation of electroacoustic research. It aims at exploring new connections between instruments, electronics and acoustics through concerts and recordings, and utilizing these in compositions." --From the liner notes. Endre Olsvay: "Allegory" (1996); Bèla Farago: "Lux Perpetua" (1997-99); Máté Hollos: "L'EAR-A" (1992); Iván Madarasz: "J.J's Games" (1995); László Thanyi: "Nereid" (1995); István Szigeti: "ChambEAR Music" (1993); Miklós Sugár: "Dreams" (1997-98). Performed by the EAR Ensemble, conducted by Miklós Sugár & Bèla Farago.

Artist:	PONGRACZ/IVAN PATACHICH, ZOLTAN
Title:	Hungarian Electroacoustic Music
Label:	HUNGAROTON (HUNGARY)
Format:	CD
Price:	$17.00
Catalog #:	HUNG 31985CD

2001 release. "The spread of electro-acoustic music in Hungary was hindered for a long time by the lack of a studio of adequate technical standard. At first Zoltán Pongrácz has his own studio, then a few years later, in 1972, a modestly equipped workshop was established with the guidance of Iván Patachich. After two years' experimental work, the Hungarian Radio electro-acoustic music studio came into being in 1975 as part of the Hungarian Film Producing Company. During the 1970s the circle of composers began to widen. Many had completed music studies of this sort abroad. However, the originators of the genre in Hungary were the two, already mentioned, composers: Zoltán Pongrácz and Iván Patachich. Pongrácz has been the representative figure of Hungarian electro-acoustic music, and Patachich, though he worked in many genres, the bulk of his works were composed in the studio of Hungarian Radio, with traditional sounds augmented by electro-acoustic experimentation. This collection spans these two artists' output from 1972-1989."

Artist:	REICH, STEVE
Title:	Music For 18 Musicians
Label:	HUNGAROTON (HUNGARY)
Format:	CD
Price:	$17.00
Catalog #:	HUNG 32208CD

Peformed by Amadinda Percussion Group and Musicians, recorded live in Budapest, 1990. "For the most part I have no interest in 'live' recordings. My ensemble has made many of them over the years for various European Radio stations and I never listen to them. (Perhaps I should.) Whenever my ensemble records we have always recorded in a multi-track studio. However, once in a great while, a fine recording is made of a miraculous concert -- and this is what we have on this CD. Studio enhancements are replaced by a magic performance. The performance is so astoundingly good and played with such amazing energy, that one is simply swept along." -- Steve Reich. July2003.

Artist:	BARTOK, BELA
Title:	Violin Concerto: Rhapsodies For Violin & Orchestra
Label:	HUNGAROTON (HUNGARY)
Format:	CD/SACD
Price:	$19.00
Catalog #:	HUNG 32509CD

Performed by Barnabás Kelemen, violin; Hungarian National Philharmonic Orhcestra / Zoltán Kocsis, conductor. "A warmly anticipated new release in the critically acclaimed Hungaroton Bartók series, featuring the award winning conductor Zoltán Kocsis. The three works on this disc are all from roughly the same period. They were composed during a time when the anti-fascist Bartók was having many problems with the establishment in Hungary. Bartók would shortly depart for the United States, where he settled in New York City in 1940. Barnabás Kelemen has established himself as one of the leading violinists of his generation, appearing regularly as a concerto soloist, recitalist, and chamber musician at many of the world's major musical venues and festivals. He has toured extensively throughout Europe, North and South America, South Africa, Japan and Taiwan. He has collaborated with conductors such as Lorin Maazel, Sir Neville Marriner, Denis Russel-Davies, Eiji Oue, Robert Spano, Zoltán Kocsis, Michael Stern, Péter Eötvös, Tamás Vásáry and Rumon Gamba. Barnabás has performed at Amsterdam's Concertgebouw, London's Wigmore Hall, and New York's Carnegie Hall where his debut was reviewed as 'a dazzling performance' (American Record Guide). Barnabás' repertoire spans from early baroque to contemporary music. He performed the Hungarian premieres of the Ligeti and Schnittke Violin Concertos and gave the Hungarian premiere of Gubajdulina's and world premiere of Kurtág's violin pieces." Stereo/multichannel hybrid SACD that can be played on any CD player.

Artist:	BARTOK, BELA
Title:	Music For Strings, Percussion & Celesta
Label:	HUNGAROTON (HUNGARY)
Format:	CD/SACD
Price:	$19.00
Catalog #:	HUNG 32510CD

Featured works: Music for Strings, Percussion & Celesta (1936); Divertimento for strings (1939); Hungarian Sketches for orchestra (1931). Performed by Hungarian National Philharmonic Orchestra/Zoltan Kocsis. "Like the preponderance of Béla Bartók's works, the three orchestral compositions dating from the 1930s on his recording, too, are deeply rooted in old 'multicultural' Hungary's folk and peasant music. This is nowhere more evident than in Hungarian Sketches (1931), a suite based on piano pieces composed between 1908 and 1911, in which Bartók relies so heavily on folk-music types of form and melody that one has the impression that they are arrangements of authentic dances and songs (which, except for the last movement, does not hold true). The relationship with folk music in Music for Strings, Percussion and Celesta (1936) and Divertimento (1939), however, is considerably more abstract; it is perceivable only under the surface and the 'national' stylistic elements meld seamlessly with the composer's own musical idiom. According to Bartók's own classification the three works embody two different types of using folk-music material." Stereo/multichannel hybrid SACD that can be played on any CD player.

Artist:	VA
Title:	Beáta Móri Message: Young Contemporary Hungarian...
Label:	HUNGAROTON (HUNGARY)
Format:	CD
Price:	$17.00
Catalog #:	HUNG 32594CD

...Composers For Cimbalom. Featured works: Ilona Mesko (*1981): Mill Songs; Short Pieces; Poesie. Peter Zombola (*1983): Preludium; Institutio I/A. Mate Bella: Message; Messag 02. Balazs Horvath (1942 ? 2006): Gritty Street - for the 65th anniversary of Z. Jeney; Further Series. Daniel Dinyes: Ouverture, Air, Double. Marton Kerekfy: Rhapsody. Performed by Beáta Móri, cimbalom, Krisztina Dobner, flute, Zsolt Bartek, clarinet. "It was the 20th century when the international fame and recognition of the cimbalom started to grow exponentially. Today, a wide choice awaits musicians ranging from being an independent soloist of a concerto to playing in the most varied chamber ensembles. The relationship between composers and musicians works ideally; new compositions are played by outstanding experts and, in turn, cimbalom players abound in new pieces. What is more, as it is also demonstrated by our present recording, it is still possible to say something new through the cimbalom. Here, eleven pieces composed by six young composers will have been heard in the rendition of Beáta Móri, who -- despite her youth -- can already take pride in having several dedications."

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Artist:	GROUP 180
Title:	Music For Pieces of Wood
Label:	HUNGAROTON (HUNGARY)
Format:	CD
Price:	$17.00
Catalog #:	HUNG 12545CD

Artist:	VA
Title:	Computer Music
Label:	HUNGAROTON (HUNGARY)
Format:	LP
Price:	$23.00
Catalog #:	SLPX 12809LP