I. MOVIE CLIPS WITH MUSIC BY CONTEMPORARY COMPOSERSPETRASADANT SZAPPHO KITHARANAPFOGYATKOZÁSWALDEN (on a composition of Barnabás Dukay)II. CALIBANShort film made by archaic technique, based on Shakespeare's The Tempest, on music by Jü (András (Halmos, Ernő Hock, Ádám Mészáros). The screening will be introduced by film- and music critic László Kolozsi (in Hungarian).Guest: Csaba Bollók - director, cinematographer

The music of András Dés Trio has no truck with distinctions between genres, while it successfully manages to eschew the congenital defects often resulting from the fusing of genres; it continually seeks for the new, but through the use of familiar musical elements it creates a comfortable acoustic homeliness for the listener; it radiates enthusiasm, and even in its most serious moments it has a message for us: there is nothing more marvellous than music. It takes its inspiration from a variety of sources, both traditional and non-traditional. Look for jazz and you won’t find it. But if you allow the timbral suggestibility of the music to percolate, you will enjoy a rich tapestry of entwining voices, sound-worlds, and musical horizons. “The creativity of the musicians is so strong that we don’t see what else could be added to this orchestral trio. Finely crafted guitars mix with the countless percussions of András Dés, whom his sons call perhaps the worst singer in the world, but who turns out to be one of the most inventive percussionists of today, and not only in Hungary. His research is based on the melody, and all is a pretense to emphasize the notes of the guitars. The trio’s symphony lies between the autocracy of classical music and the anarchy of free jazz, somewhere where an underlying framework, suggested and not limited, almost watermarked, offers a space for exchange, listening, and self-expression. In a totally free and open approach, the music resounds as evidence, a harmony rises slowly to hatch the idea of ​​tolerance, dear to the composer.” Raphaël Benoit, Citizenjazz

The musicians of the ethno-jazz / contemporary chamber music outfit Trio Squelini played together for years in various groups, like Tin Tin Q, Ektar Szőke Quartet and others. The trio, starting with occasional performances, made its first recording in 2014, and became a regular concert act since its release, entitled Campiello. In 2016 they made their second release, Furioso, with contribution of the outstanding Hungarian celloist, Ditta Rohmann. The trio often invites a guest to their concerts, so each time their program shows up in different shades, with ever-changing emphasis on its colours and proportions similarly like the Rouen cathedral on Monet’s famous series. This time, the characteristic guitar playing of the excellent guitarist, Zsolt Csókás, takes care of the trio’s special colouring. facebook.com/triosquelini  

Over the past decade, bassist Linda May Han Oh has been hailed as one of the most gifted bassists, bandleaders and composers of her generation. She is a virtuoso who can swing hard while keeping instrumental grace and precision, structuring her lines through a most free-flowing cascade of ideas. After completing her master's degree at the Manhattan School of Music in 2008, she recorded her debut album, Entry with trumpeter Ambrose Akinmusire and drummer Obed Calvaire. In the following years she has been working with heavy-weights like Pat Metheny, Dave Douglas, Vijay Iyer, Joe Lovano and Steve Coleman. On her fourth album, Walk Against Wind, Oh explores both the challenges and the rich rewards of an artist’s journey. “Walk Against Wind is about the paths that we choose,” Oh explains. “Sometimes they end up being the harder paths, but in the long run they prove more fruitful.” The album is the spiritual successor to Oh’s acclaimed 2013 release Sun Pictures, with returning saxophonist Ben Wendel joined by guitarist Matthew Stevens drummer Justin Brown. In addition, pianist/keyboardist Fabian Almazan and Korean traditional musician Minji Park appear as special guests with the quartet, which has been workshopping Oh’s compositions at a variety of New York hotspots including the 55 Bar, the Jazz Gallery and Minton’s Harlem.

Whenever we think of the piccolo as the flute’s little sister, the orchestral instrument’s peculiar, high-pitched sound comes to mind, evoking the chirping of birds. Originally adopted from military bands in the 18th century, the piccolo is increasingly employed in music, but as a solo instrument - outside orchestras and ensembles - it only gained prominence in the last few decades. On the second concert of the Piccolo Pearls series Dávid will perform new works of four Hungarian, an American and an Australian composer. Flutist Dávid Kanyó has been playing the piccolo in the Dohnányi Orchestra Budafok for 15 years, covering most of its classical repertoire. He is devoted to promoting the instrument by presenting new pieces. His long-time chamber partner, pianist Balázs Réti will join him for the present concert.

Ágnes Lakatos is one of the best-known Hungarian jazz singers, teaching jazz singing at the Liszt Ferenc Music Academy and at the Bartók Béla Music Secondary School. She has been featured on quite many albums while Covered by frost, her first release with her own quartet, came out in 2000. As singer of the East Side Jazz Company, she is heard on two albums – Bora (2003) and Fata Morgana (2006). Tibor Csuhaj Barna teaches jazz bass at the Liszt Ferenc Academy of Music, while at the jazz department of the Bartók Béla Music Secondary School he's teaching bass, double bass and orchestral practice. He is a member of several groups, has worked on more than 30 albums as a double bass player, being composer and arranger of six of them. Voice and Bass, the duo of the singer and the double bass player, has released two albums, Voice and Bass (2008) and Into the Groove (2013), comprised mostly of original compositions. The duo's featured guest this time is pianist Máté Pozsár who is no stranger to the audience of Opus Jazz Club, performing regularly at the club as the member of the Grencsó Open Collective, the AMP Trio, or lately with his own sextet.

More info coming soon.

The music produced and performed by the Hungarian based ensemble Tariqa is simultaneously reminiscent of the proto world-music innovations of John Coltrane’s Africa Brass in the 60s and the 70s futuristic Sufi inspired jazz of the Human Arts Ensemble. Led by Saïd Tichiti originally from the Moroccan Sahara, Tariqa’s ecstatic momentum is firmly based on gnawa drumming and guembri bass lines spiced by rippling carpathian cimbalom, violins and flute. Top this all with Saharian desert blues vocals and horn parts full of urgent urban American howling and Klezmer screams, and the effect is nothing less than 21st century musical bliss. Tariqa’s new CD is a musical breakthrough Bartok, Coltrane and the late Ali Farka Toure would all likely relate to. Blessed and possessed by the powerful spirits that inhabit the Euro-Asian-African crossroads that shaped and continue to shape our destiny – Tariqa swings and rocks hard to a warm universal musical embrace. Darrell Jónsson tariqa.bandcamp.com 

The two-day long masterclass of Johanna Dömötör and Dávid Simon will be topped by a closing concert in which the students of the course perform along with Johanna and Dávid. The performance will consist of the pieces put together during the sessions. Johanna Dömötör received her first lessons at the age of seven and was later selected for the class of highly talented at the Béla Bartók Conservatory in Budapest. At the age of sixteen she made her debut at the Kölner Philharmonie and received a scholarship of the Deutsche Stiftung Musikleben. She studied with Prof. Jean-Claude Gérard in Stuttgart and Prof. Andrea Lieberknecht in Hanover. Between 2009 and 2011 she was a student of Prof. Davide Formisano’s soloist class in Stuttgart. Johanna Dömötör is the winner of several competitions and scholarships. In 2005 she won the European Cultural Award of the Kulturstiftung Pro Europa, the fellowship of the L‐Bank Baden-Württemberg and in 2007 she won the Gundlach-Prize – the most valuable musical scholarship in Germany. In 2009 she was finalist and winner at the 3. International Flute Competition in Timisoara for the best interpretation of the commissioned work. She had the privilege to be scholar holder of the chamber music foundation Villa Musica for three years, which granted her with a Anton-Braun piccolo flute. In this time she also won the Villa-Musica advancement award. The Lutz-E.-Adolf foundation for highly talented supported her with a sponsoring for a Muramatsu-Flute with 14K gold headjoint. As soloist she has performed with the New Japan Philharmonic Orchestra, the Chamber Orchestra Stuttgart, the Budapest Festival Orchestra and the Helsinki Philharmonic Orchestra to name a few. Johanna Dömötör has been invited to be guest at renowned orchestras including the Bavarian Radio Symphony Orchestra, the WDR Symphony Orchestra, the Gürzenich Orchestra Cologne, the SWR Symphony Orchestra Freiburg and the Teatro alla Scala Milano. She was able to work with conductors such as Zubin Mehta, Daniele Gatti, Esa-Pekka Salonen, Daniel Harding, Kurt Masur, Lorin Maazel and Daniel Barenboim. 2010-2012 she held the principal flautist position at the Basel Symphony Orchestra. Alongside her chamber music activities in various ensembles she devotes herself passionately to both Early and Contemporary Music. She is a highly valued guest at festivals such as the Menuhin Festival Gstaad, the Zermatt-Festival (in collaboration with the Scharoun-Ensemble of the Berlin Philharmonic Orchestra), the Schleswig Holstein Music Festival as well as the Global-Interplay Festival in Beijing, Shanghai and New York. Supporter: YAMAHA Music Branch Europe, Austria

While Vivaldi is most famous as a composer, he was regarded as an exceptional technical violinist as well. In September 1703, he became maestro di violino at an orphanage called the Pio Ospedale della Pietà in Venice. Vivaldi was only 25 when he started working at the orphanage. Over the next thirty years he composed most of his major works while working there. The girls received a musical education, and the most talented among them stayed and became members of the Ospedale's renowned orchestra and choir. Shortly after Vivaldi's appointment, the orphans began to gain appreciation and esteem abroad, too. Vivaldi wrote concertos, cantatas and sacred vocal music for them. These sacred works, which number over 60, are varied: they included solo motets and large-scale choral works for soloists, double chorus, and orchestra. This oeuvre is presented by the Concerto Armonico Budapest and György Lakatos at BMC in a concert series which arrives to its fifth installment in April 2019.

Thea Soti: VØICES / Budapest Edition VØICES is the art research project started in 2018 by experimental singer and composer Thea Soti. The project sets out to map connections between the human voice and interdisciplinary performance.

“From complex yet readable convoluted patterns, to unrelenting courses under vibrant sparks of freedom, this simply is jazz, jazz today and jazz tomorrow!” Xavier Prévost, Jazz Magazine, January 2017 By creating this group in 2014, the marvellous and fascinating multi-faceted flutist, Sylvaine Hélary, wanted to explore a way of composing that drew its inspiration as much from her contemporary music education, her encounters with musicians from New-York (Tim Berne, Kris Davis, Tony Malaby, Ralph Alessi) and her wild years playing unclassifiable pop music (Martine à la plage, Fantazio). Spring Roll’s instrumentation is pretty uncommon. Flutes, a saxophone or clarinet, a piano, a double bass, mostly bells or keyboards. To which can be added an analog synthesizer and a ring modulator that allows at some moments live treatments of the piano. The partition takes us between the most stripped-down minimalism and an orchestral maelstrom. Building together such sounds never heard before, this is what drives above all the four musicians of this band. It can easily be linked to New Music and its way of sharing improvisations and compositions. Sylvaine Hélary “has appropriated the musical territories where improvisation, contemporary music, sonic poetry, musical theatre, uncommon pop-music and ultra-modern post-jazz exchange their proprieties and mingle their identities [...] This band is ideal for the flute-player to experiment on hybrid compositions that build bridges between the repetitive and hypnotic universe of Morton Feldman and the progressive and self-generated patterns of the young New York generation [...] This sensorial music enchants us by its intelligence, its refinement, its freshness and great maturity.” Stéphane Ollivier, Jazz Magazine Printemps, the group's first album was released in 2015 on Ayler Records while their next, Big Apple’s Flavor, appears in March 2019 on Clean Feed. sylvainehelary.com 

The modern mainstream group, Equinox, has performed at many jazz festivals both in Hungary and abroad. Their repertoire, comprised of compositions by Ferenc Erkel Award-winning composer and leader Tibor Márkus, is characterized by the use of modern compositional elements yet preserving melodiousness and receptibility. The group made their first album in 2004, with their brand new release, Through the Time, they are celebrating their 25th anniversary. The CD features along with Tibor Márkus and the current lineup also founding members - Imre Héder, Linda Kovács and Martina Király - as well. On the present Anniversary Album Debut Concert at Opus Jazz Club Equinox Septet’s special guest will be the leading Hungarian jazz musician, guitarist Gábor Juhász, who often performs on the group’s albums and concerts. facebook.com/markustiborequinox 

When an outstanding soloist plays with us, the orchestra’s energy is considerably multiplied. Focusing on the three world-famous musicians, Gustav Rivinius cellist, Alexander Sitkovetsky and David Grimal violinists, Anima Musicae Chamber Orchestra’s new concert series, Anima³ will be organised at Budapest Music Center’s stage. Having the prestigious title of „National Youth Orchestra” for the years 2018-2020, our guest artists play with us for the first time. Gustav Rivinius is the first and only German musician to be awarded a first prize Gold Medal at the 1990 International Tchaikovsky Competition in Moscow. Among the many high points of an illustrious career, Gustav Rivinius has performed with the Bavarian Radio Symphony Orchestra, conducted by Lorin Maazel, Czech Philharmonic Orchestra, conducted by Vaclav Neumann, London Philharmonia under Heinrich Schiff, Pittsburgh Symphony Orchestra, conducted byMarek Janowski. Along with his solo work, Gustav Rivinius has a passion for chamber music. Having been born into a large musical family, he plays regularly alongside his brothers in the Rivinius Piano Quartet and does recitals with his brother Paul at the piano. He participated for years in a quintet with Irena Grafenauer, Maria Graf, Ana Chumachenco and Gérard Caussé. The musician also founded the Gasparo da Saló Trio, the Arkas Trio, the Bartholdy String Quintet and the Tammuz Piano Quartet. Gustav Rivinius is a professor at the HFM University of Music in Saarbrucken where he oversees a highly successful cello class. He also teaches at the Conservatorium Maastricht (The Netherlands) from autumn 2014 on, and at a number of masters courses annually.  

For the 2018/2019 season, the Rondo Quartet returns to the BMC Library to perform a three-part concert series. All three performances will feature one piece from the first quartet componist, Joseph Haydn's last complete cycle, the Erdődy Quartets. Haydn's quartets will be complemented by those of Janaček, including a string arrangement of a piano cycle, all intriguing due to their treatment of structure and arrangement. Finally, quartets by Ives, Copland and Cage will showcase the ideas American composers had about this particularly European chamber music genre.

David Yengibarian (born 1976 in Yerevan) began to play the accordion at the age of ten. From 1995 he continued his musical studies in Hungary where he soon became one of the most sought-after jazz and world music performers and composers. He released five CDs, two of them on BMC Records, played on many festivals and composed music for numerous theatre-pieces and films. The main source of inspiration for his individual musical world is Armenian musical tradition, European and American jazz and improvised music, Argentinian tango, and the ‘tango nuevo’ of Astor Piazzolla. He founded his trio in 1999, and despite undergoing several incarnations in the last two decades, it sustains its special sound consequently. davidyengibarian.com 

Professional Extension Course for Music Teachers, led by Dr. Zsuzsa Pásztor and Anna Négyesi.(In Hungarian)

It is often that not radical innovators but keepers are those who play a main role in the history of music. Composers who consciously keep and save some of the values of recent or past times. And, of course, even the most daring ones can turn out to be ones whoe are revitalizing tradition. Budapest Strings are inviting the audience to a dialogue of moderns and classics again, and offer delicacies such as Schönberg's juvenile circulatory, the orchestral music by the Bach-sons, pieces of great Hungarian classical music or compositions by Judit Varga, Máté Balogh and Adam Brandenburg.

The exceptional viola player, leader and composer Szilárd Mezei from Zenta, Vojvodina, is widely considered as the next composer in Hungarian music history, who – keeping a continuity after Béla Bartók and György Szabados – treats folk music in an exceptional way. He played with his Septet at Opus last summer, this time he arrives with his eleven-member-group, Túl a Tiszán Innen Ensemble. The orchestra was founded in 2014, releasing its first double album Hungarian Folk Songs from Vojvodina the next year, followed in 2017 by their second double-CD, Nem füstöl a zentaji gyár kéménye (=The chimney of the factory in Zenta doesn't smoke anymore), published on the English Slam label. “Mezei is a composer as well as an arranger and in this case, a celebrator, so authenticity and/or recreation shouldn’t really figure into appreciation for this set. Among the squirming and jumping themes throughout that allow for individual expression among the band members there are contiguous creations that stand out for compositional smarts, often by being multi-stylistic.” (Ken Waxman, JazzWord)

Rendező: Magyar Zeneiskolák és Művészeti Iskolák Szövetsége Támogató: Budapest Főváros Főpolgármesteri Hivatal 'Iskolakapun kívül' program

The Jazz AllStars Project is an adventure in music presented by jazz pianist Péter Sárik. Every concert showcases Hungarian jazz greats who join Péter Sárik for a one-time-only show. This time the Jazz AllStars Project features the excellent Hungarian trumpeter, Áron Koós-Hutás, drummer & singer Tamás Hidász and double bass player Tibor Fonay.

Young Czech jazz pianist and composer from Ostrava, Jan Kavka, earned his master’s degree in jazz piano interpretation last year at the Music Academy im Karola Szymanowskiego in Katowice (Poland). Beside being member of several groups Kavka leads with his two fellow musicians, winners of several jazz competitions as Powiew Młodego Jazzu, Jazz Fruit or Central European Jazz Competition, his acoustic project, Jan Kavka Trio (JKT). The trio came to being in 2013 on occasion of a series of jazz nights in the coctail bar Modrá Myš in Ostrava. From 2016 JKT did a lot of concerts all over the Czech Republic and as well as in Poland. Starting with jazz standards in the beginning, JKT soon widened their repertoire with original compositon and arrangements of pop songs. In April 2018, JKT released their debut CD, Past Stories. which won the 2nd price on the “Česká Jazzová Sklizeň” (=Czech Jazz Harvest) poll, organized by Czech Radio Jazz.  “All tracks are characteristic by distinctive melodic themes, exemplary work with dynamics, fluctuation of musical flow, often up to stunning gradation and excellent solos. Debut par excellence!” Jan Hocek - Jazzport.cz “Jan Kavka Trio’s debut with his Past Stories is important to listen to as this ‘past’ soon can become an indispensable part of your future. You can be sure you won’t regret it.” Milan Bátor - Ostravan.cz jankavka.cz 

Turumtay / Erdoğan / Liška / Dés is a quartet of extraordinary virtuosi with different musical and cultural backgrounds and explores ever-widening musical horizons and seeks to find a collective identity. Vienna-based violinist Efe Turumtay is accompanied by Tomáš Liška's dazzling bass lines, András Dés‘s moving rhythm partitions and melancholic tunes of Turkish fretless guitar virtuoso Cenk Erdoğan. The quartet defines what it is to be a performer and composer ensemble and proves to be an essential voice in world music scene today. The original compositions of Turumtay, Liška, Dés and Erdoğan show the audience a through-line between seemingly disparate worlds and remind us that great music is international.

Historians often depict the Elizabethan age as the golden age in English history. Beside ruling the Empire with an iron fist, the queen was also a fan of arts - and music in particular; several sources speak of her mastery of the virginal. Her instrument, one of the few prized personal items, was made in Venice, Italy, and is now kept at the Victoria and Albert Museum. Italy's influence was indeed strong: most of the keyboard instruments arrived from there, just as Italian composers were heavily influencing their English counterparts. Zsombor Tóth-Vajna will be performing keyboard pieces from the era on a copy of Hyeronimus Bononiensis' 1521 harpsichord made in Rome.

Live Stream on Fidelio.hu's Facebook page Cherchez la femme! Behind every great man there is a peculiar woman (or more). And, from time to time, beasts with a radiant vibe come into sight to play a central role in the life of whole generations of artists. Such was Alma Mahler, with her dozens of genius lovers / husbands, or the eccentric George Sand in men’s clothes who, beside the fierce romance matters with Chopin could be a center of the intellectual life of whole Paris. She was the first audience and critic to many masterpieces of Chopin and Liszt, therefore, their most beautiful melodies reflect the impact of this marvelous woman. In the concert, between the compositions, informative reviews will be announced in Hungarian.

“Over the past 25 years, I have composed a lot of musical pieces, some of which are still close to my heart. This solo piano album contains some of my favourites. As rhythm plays a key role in my play and I like using the lower and middle registers of the piano, we tried to create a more bass-oriented sound that suits my style. Another reason why this record is special is that this time there is more emphasis on compositions than on improvisations. Not only does this compilation mark the end of my fairly long first creative period, but it also opens a new chapter in my career.” Zsolt Kaltenecker about his solo piano album, Revisited.  www.facebook.com/ZsoltKalteneckerArtistPage instagram.com/zsoltkaltenecker 

Like Don Giovanni with a pinch of Cosi fan Tutte, this comic opera performed in Hungarian for a young audience, is full of suitors, mix-ups, disguises and happy endings in one act midst the gorgeous classical music of Haydn. Hungarian text and direction: Máté Hámori

Guillaume de Machaut (c1300–1377) is one of the foremost figures in the history of Western music. His oeuvre is unparallelled in all major genres of his day and his musical innovations spread like wildfire. Renassiance music was born from Machaut's art which subsequently became a major influence on every style of music. His self-consciousness as a composer and poet was 50 years ahead of his time: he might even be considered the first avantgarde artist. In the present four lectures and the accompanying concerts, János Bali sets out to expose Machaut's musical hearing and show how the most powerful intellectual trends of his time appear in the composer's mentality as musical elements. 

Cherchez la femme! Behind every great man there is a peculiar woman (or more). And, from time to time, beasts with a radiant vibe come into sight to play a central role in the life of whole generations of artists. Such was Alma Mahler, with her dozens of genius lovers / husbands, or the eccentric George Sand in men’s clothes who, beside the fierce romance matters with Chopin could be a center of the intellectual life of whole Paris. She was the first audience and critic to many masterpieces of Chopin and Liszt, therefore, their most beautiful melodies reflect the impact of this marvelous woman. In the concert, between the compositions, informative reviews will be announced in Hungarian.

Júlia Karosi has been known on the Hungarian jazz scene as a defining figure in the genre for years now. In 2009, she founded the Júlia Karosi Quartet, whose repertoire consists mostly of her original compositions, a blend of classical music and modern jazz. Her 2014 album Hidden Roots, released in New York, delves deeply into the relationship between her musical roots and jazz. This exploration produced original compositions and Hungarian folk song arrangements which received critical acclaim both at home and abroad. Motivated by this success, Karosi continued her research into the deeply rooted culture of Hungarian music, where she found renewed inspiration at the source: the works of Bartók and Kodály. Since 2018, she has been working on vocal arrangements of Bartók and Kodály works on a scholarship from the Hungarian Academy of Arts.  With a program, comprised partially of these arrangments, the Júlia Karosi Quartet presented the final concert of the Hungarian Jazz Showcase at MUPA in February, featuring one of New York's most sought-after guitarists, Ben Monder, as their special guest. The release of Without Dimension, the quartet’s new album, is expected by end of this year.

A Budapesti Fuvola Akadémia hagyományteremtő szándékkal rendezi meg első egynapos kurzusát. Ez alkalommal a West Virginia University fuvola professzora, Nina Assimakopoulos látogat el a Budapest Music Centerbe. A kurzus után a művésznő egy rövid koncertet is ad a program résztvevőinek.Bővebb információért kérjük látogassanak el a művésznő honlapjára. A program az NKA támogatásával jön létre.

By inviting Gergely Fazekas to my piano recital series, I am expecting a new type of dialogue between the music historian and the artist which might even involve the audience. Before and during the pieces, we will be able to consider parts and aspects of the music which speak to us. (Gábor Csalog)

The excellent pianist, Máté Pozsár has been recognized so far as an active figure in the creative free jazz and free music scene in Hungary, being member of groups by István Grencsó, Szilárd Mezei and György Baló, as well as of the A.M.P. Trio. However, being himself not just a fan but even professor in music theory, he has been speculating since a longer time about a conceptual compositional approach based on harmonies and voices inherent in modal and polymodal harmonics. He invited his close musical friends to join his drumless sextet in order to realize this concept about a slowly-built, transparent chamber music, exuberant both in binding terms and free improvisation.

SUNSET(Napszállta)Hungarian-French drama film, 2018, 144 min. - In Hungariandirected by László Nemes Jelesscript: László Nemes Jeles, Clara Royer, Matthieu Taponiermusic by László Meliscinematography: Mátyás Erdélyeditor: Matthieu Taponierproducer: Gábor Sipos, Gábor RajnaFeaturing: Juli Jakab, Evelin Dobos, Vlad Ivanov, Björn Freiberg, Susanne Wuest, Judit Bárdos, Móni Balsai, Levente Molnár, Urs Rechn, Sándor Zsótér, Mihály Kormos The screening will be introduced by film- and music critic László Kolozsi (in Hungarian).Guest: László Nemes Jeles - director 1913, Budapest, in the heart of Europe. The young Irisz Leiter arrives in the Hungarian capital with high hopes to work as a milliner at the legendary hat store that belonged to her late parents. She is nonetheless sent away by the new owner, Oszkár Brill. While preparations are under way at the Leiter hat store, to host guests of uttermost importance, a man abruptly comes to Irisz, looking for a certain Kálmán Leiter. Refusing to leave the city, the young woman follows Kálmán's tracks, her only link to a lost past. Her quest brings her through the dark streets of Budapest, where only the Leiter hat store shines, into the turmoil of a civilization on the eve of its downfall.

“Kalnein is a master of catchy cadenzas, the finest earworm potential sprays from his pen. KAHIBA guarantees pure excitement, pure arrangements for a deep immersion in a cosmos of sound” wrote the Austrian magazine Concerto about their CD The Sixth Sense and Michael Scheiner seconded it on occasion of one of her live concerts: “... a firework of ideas, intense mood changes and thrilling improvisations.” Heinrich von Kalnein, the German saxophonist and flutist living in Austria, is the mastermind behind the KAHIBA project, founded in 2009. Since 2016, with the Turkish pianist Anıl Bilgen and the Swiss drummer and electronic engineer Gregor Hilbe three musicians from different backgrounds and generations meet in this brilliant trio, all self-sufficient as well as experienced, equipped with their own will and a stupendous instrumental technical skill. KAHIBA – “a stroke of luck”, as Martin Laurentius from the German magazine Jazzthing puts it – play their own music: a virtuoso and unique mix of jazz, musica brasileira, free improvised music, electronics and “folklore imaginaire”. Free from stylistic constraints and without blinders, the three improvisational artists invent their own music together in a playful way. The trio’s fifth album, The Neuroscience of Music, was released in March 2018 on Natango Music, Kalnein’s own label.  kahibamusic.com heinrichvonkalnein.com gregorhilbe.com 

Shalosh’s 2014 debut album The Bell Garden earned the Israeli trio the respect of the international press. In it they blended lyrical passages with strong grooves, and jazz and rock elements are infused with Oriental influences. Paying musical tribute to Nirvana, Brahms and The Bad Plus, the self-produced follow-up album Rules of Oppression is also a great achievement – at times chamber music-like, at times anthemic and opulent, with the piano, bass and drums complemented by a seven-strong wind ensemble and string quartet. In addition to their own compositions, the three Tel Avivers also perform cover versions of songs such as Lana del Rey’s “Video Games”, which is given a nine-minute improvised make-over on their second album. Not quite jazz, not quite rock, Shalosh make life difficult for genre fetishists. They prefer to describe their music as “acoustic progressive music”. The trio arrives to Budapest on the eve of their third album release, Onwards and Upwards on ACT Music. shalosh.net 

Guitarist for Tom Waits, Marc Ribot is coming to Budapest in 2019 to present his solo project. During the past decades Ribot has worked together with artists like Jack McDuff, Wilson Pickett, Chuck Berry, Robert Plant, Elvis Costello, John Mellencamp, Diana Krall, Marianne Faithful, Laurie Anderson, McCoy Tyner, a Medeski, Martin & Wood, James Carter, Allen Ginsburg, Madeleine Peyroux or Norah Jones, Jeff Bridges and Elton John in the recent past.

“Beautiful music! It's an album full of surprises, a journey that pleases the listener's ears and souls. Exciting rhythmic transitions, soundscapes and funky rhytms will keep the listeners captivated throughout this album” - writes Ferenc Németh New York based jazz drummer about debut album of Bendegúz Varga, released in March. The music of the group reflects the wide-ranging musical abilities and diverse tastes of its members, while the traditional acoustic jazz as lingua franca remains unquestionable. In their repertoire energetic songs by Csaba Czirják and János Ávéd are accompanied by the more deepgoing compositions of the band leader. The sound is determined by the sometimes competing, sometimes complementary play of the two virtuoso guitarists. In September 2017 they recorded their first album, Goldmund, where János Ávéd was accompanied by another tenor saxophone player, Dániel Mester. The entire material of Goldmund was performed for the first time at the Opus in March. “As in a great book where the magic glues us to our chairs, this album has an engaging story with well-defined characters; some of the chapters are whirling and adventurous, some are calmer and contemplative, with hints of Eastern-European folk idioms and ambiance.” - writes the acclaimed pianist, Dániel Szabó in the liner notes of the album. vargabendeguz.hu

A Magyar Rádió Gyermekkórusának „Palánták kórusa” (kiegészülve a legkisebbekkel) idén is pünkösdi játékkal készült. A koncerten fellépnek továbbá a Magyar Rádió Gyermekkórusának legtehetségesebb hangszeres növendékei, valamint az újonnan alakult Ifjúsági Vegyeskar. Vezényel: Dinyés Soma és Vargáné Körber Katalin

“If Bartók played not-so-straight-ahead jazz, it might sound like the Borbély Quartet, combining Serbian, Slovak, Gypsy, Jewish and German folk influences with classical music, shot through with that thing that swings. Roland Kirk would understand.” (RootsWorld) After the 2014 release of their award-winning album Hungarian Jazz Rhapsody, the next one, Be by Me Tonight was released in 2016 and won the shared first prize in the category ‘Best Hungarian Jazz Album of the Year’ of the Hungarian magazine Gramofon Classical & Jazz. The album reveals the rich, mature sound of the group, the complex beauty of the compositions with roots and influences from Hungarian and Balkan folk, music of Liszt, Bartók, Kodály as well as contemporary jazz, interwoven by the spontaneity and freshness of improvisation. “A notable release from a group that deserves an international spotlight for its obvious talent”, as Jazzwise put it in its album review. In the beginning of January, the quartet attended BMC’s studio again, to record the material for their next BMC Records release. The new pieces have even more emphasis on traditional reed instruments like tárogató, clarinets, recorder and different kinds of peasants’ pipes. At present the post-production works are going on, the album will be first available on the debut concert.

When an outstanding soloist plays with us, the orchestra’s energy is considerably multiplied. Focusing on the three world-famous musicians, Gustav Rivinius cellist, Alexander Sitkovetsky and David Grimal violinists, Anima  Musicae Chamber Orhestra’s new concert series, Anima³ will be organised at Budapest Music Center’s stage. Having the prestigious title of „National Youth Orchestra” for the years 2018-2020, our guest artists play with us for the first time. Alexander Sitkovetsky was born in Moscow into a family with a well-established musical tradition. His concerto debut came at the age of eight, and in the same year he moved to the UK to study at the Menuhin School. Lord Menuhin was his inspiration throughout his school years and they performed together on several occasions. Highlights include performances with the London Philharmonic Orchestra, Royal Philharmonic Orchestra, Konzerthaus Orchester Berlin, London Mozart Players, BBC Scottish Symphony Orchestra, just to name a few. Having a commitment to chamber music, he is a founder member of Sitkovetsky Piano Trio, which gave concerts at Wigmore Hall in London, at Concertgebouw in Amsterdam and at Carnegie Hall in New York. Since 2011 Sitkovetsky also plays in Julia Fischer Quartet.  

“When I started to play from Bartók’s For Children, somehow I was unable to get familiar with those little pieces and I always had the feel of missing something as they were opening into the sound of music. I might have been missing the classical style models or else unfolding the themes further on. Later, when I already had them in my curriculum, we often improvised on some of those ostinati or harmony sequences. These 15 little pieces constitute a designed selection from the 4-volume-work. While selecting I was trying to present moods or characters. In the course of this work I was about to get together all those techniques of composition and principles for stucture or arrangement having showed up as essential in these miniatures. I opened up the strictly designed structural framework of every piece. Likewise every one of them was augmented with an improvised period which appear as intros or outros for relaxation. There are traditional theme - improvisation - theme structures but I sometimes reharmonised the original piece into a major key and after improvising on the new sequence I returned into the original minor key which is also followed by improvisation. That is a new composition was born out of the two themes of the original piece and the improvisations on two different harmony changes. The encounter of ornamentation and scalar systems of the beautiful folk ballads and those in African-American folk music and blues were also exciting and inspiring in the creative process. I’d like to thank my friends, Ákos Benkó and Tibor Fonay, for their creative contribution and the excellent building of rhythmic backgrounds and grooves.”(excerpts from Károly Binder's sleeve notes)

Aly Keïta is one of the grand masters of the balafon, the West African xylophone. The Ivorian musician fits the balafon in interaction with artists such as Joe Zawinul, Omar Sosa and Jan Garbarek. Together with the Swiss clarinetist Jan Galega Brönnimann and Swiss drummer Lucas Niggli, Keïta mixes the traditional African repertoire with Western jazz, improvisation and African rhythms. This ‘Brotherhood of vibes and grooves’ takes the audience on an adventurous ride. The first element that underlies the music of this trio, and so Kalo-Yele (‘moonlight’ in Bambara), their album, released in 2016, is a human and affective dimension, whose origin lies many miles from Switzerland and several decades before the three musicians entered the studio. Niggli and Jan Galega Brönnimann were actually born in Cameroon and they have been friends since they were one year old! So, they spent their youth to the sounds and rhythms of West African music. Thierry Quénum writes in the liner notes: “If you ever wanted to try and classify the repertoire and interaction of these three musicians, I’d just have to wish you good luck! For each of them can handle the melody as well as the rhythm, or sail close to the jazz coasts as easily as near the banks of so called ‘world music’.”

A lecture by Zsuzsanna Gál about the role of music therapy in mental health in old age. Music Therapy Club is an open meeting-place of music therapists, medical, educational and social workers, as well as of anybody interested in music therapy. (In Hungarian) Free entry!

Organism, a Hungarian Hammond organ trio with the classical lineup of organ, guitar and drums, was formed in 2013 in Budapest. Their music touches realms of gospel, tickle roots of funk while experimenting with the language of contemporary music, using organ as sort of a big band, playing complete arrangements besides improvising.  Beside their regular appaerances in Hungary, the trio has played at inspiring venues, from small jazz clubs to festivals ind numerous cities in Germany, the Czech Republic, Poland and Transylvania.

“The ensemble’s playing is incredibly solid and well-balanced. All four musicians perform at the same level and their music-making is enthralling.” Lukas Hagen (Hagen Quartett) Established in 2007 in Korea and currently based in Germany, the Novus String Quartet is one of the leading chamber music ensembles of Korea. The Quartet has earned international reputation and recognition by winning at the International Mozart Competition in Salzburg (1st Prize) and the ARD International Chamber Music Competition in Munich (2nd Prize), as well as with its acclaimed concerts at the Wigmore Hall (London), Konzerthaus (Vienna), Musikfest Berlin and Cologne’s Philharmonie, among others. All graduated from the Korean National University of Arts, four members of the Quartet have honed their skills further as a chamber ensemble player while studying with the Professors Christoph Poppen and Hariolf Schlichtig at the Hochschule für Musik und Theater in Munich, and at the Hochschule für Musik in Lübeck with Professor Heime Mueller, former member of the Artemis Quartet. Since 2015, the Belcea Quartet has been the mentor of the Novus String Quartet. The Quartet has released two recordings under the French Label Aparté, with the works from Beethoven, Weber and Isang Yun for the 1st album, and Tchaikovsky’s 1st string quartet as well as the sextet “Souvenir de Florence” for the 2nd one. The year of 2019 will see the release of the third recording of the string quartet with Berg’s Lyric Suite and Schubert’s quartet “Death and the Maiden.” This program is a part of the official cultural programs commemorating the 30th anniversary of diplomatic relationship between Hungary and Korea.

Kaja Draksler, Petter Eldh and Christian Lillinger are among the most thrilling, deep, and versatile figures to emerge in Europe over the last decade and the music of the trio is nothing less than a hybrid of personalities largely unimaginable if one examined the work of the players outside of this configuration. They knew they had something special right away. Lillinger and Eldh have been working together for much of the last decade, forming an implacable bond within the wildly agile quartet Amok Amor with trumpeter Peter Evans and saxophonist Wanja Slavin. “We've really found a way to morph and stretch forms and groove, and I feel there's a very strong core between us,” says the drummer. “And Kaja is able to avoid that and deal with it at the same, which means she is able to shape or color things in her own way.” “Some of the pieces are complex and demand accuracy, but on the other hand, none of us are very precious about it,” explains Draksler. “So there is inherent freedom … the music and the energy is much more important than correct notes, yet we want to get it right. And there is trust.” (excerpt from Peter Margasak's liner notes to the trio’s album, released November 2018)

“Composition with strong impact and three musicians’ playing with full of confidence remind us the fact that Jazz is not mere a legacy with the conventions of the past, but a living musical language that speaks of both the past and the present.” EBS Broadcasting’s music program ‘Space GongGam’   HEO Trio, formed in 2013 by the acclaimed Korean composer/pianist Daeuk Heo, is a jazz ensemble based in France. Three musicians from Korea and France attract audiences and critics alike with unique style of composition and sound derived from the cultural combination of Eastern and Western worlds. Daeuk Heo, who originally studied classical composition, is one of the leading jazz musicians in Korea. Free improvisation based on his own lyrical and clear tone has been his signature music style. While studying and playing in the French jazz field, Heo formed HEO Trio together with two brilliant French jazz musicians, Alexis Coutureau on double bass and Kevin Lucchetti on drums. Over the last five years, the trio has placed consistent efforts on finding various musical languages, by trying different formats including solo, trio and string orchestra, as well as by accommodating each member’s musical characters and ideas. This has eventually led the trio to move forward beyond a usual jazz trio sound and achieve its uniqueness on the European jazz scene. Their music keeps a beautiful balance between Eastern and Western culture, as well as between the group’s organic sound structure and the individuality of each instrument. A double bass solo, improvised by Kevin Lucchetti on a Korean traditional piece for solo strings, is an excellent example for instance to offer us a different aspect of the term, ‘fusion of cultures.’  In 2019, the trio’s new album, Sherpa will be released on the renowned French jazz label, Cristal Records.  This program is part of the official cultural programs commemorating the 30th anniversary of diplomatic relationship between Hungary and Korea.

Harold López-Nussa’s music reflects the full range and richness of Cuban music, with its distinctive combination of classical, folkloric and popular elements, as well as its embrace of jazz improvisation and interaction. His career gracefully spans styles. Un Día Cualquiera, his second release for Mack Avenue Records, represents this musical vantage point with force and innovation. He tells this story—his story—with drama, heartfelt emotion and consummate skills. López-Nussa was born 1983 in Havana, where he still lives. “I need the kind of relaxed life that Havana gives me,” he said. For López-Nussa, whose award-winning music has led to international tours and who holds dual citizenship in Cuba and France. “Every time I return to Cuba, I feel something special—not just a connection with my family and friends, but with the place itself. This is where my music comes from, what it talks about.” His previous Mack Avenue album, El Viaje (The Journey), was released on the heels of President Obama’s historic 2016 visit to Havana, against a backdrop of newly relaxed trade and travel restrictions. Un Día Cualquiera arrives as U.S. restrictions regarding Cuba again tighten under the Trump administration; considered in that light, the album is an affirmative statement that music will always cross borders and defy obstacles. “I want to grow closer to the American people,” López-Nussa said. “This has always been an important desire for Cubans, especially musicians. It’s impossible for us to be separate because we have so much in common, so much to share.” Musically, Lopez-Nussa’s last album augmented his band with additional instruments and influences, including Senegalese bassist Alune Wade, to achieve a globalized sound. For “Un Día Cualquiera,” Lopéz-Nussa sticks to his core trio, with his younger brother Ruy Adrián López-Nussa on drums and percussion, and bassist Gaston Joya—a group the pianist first convened a decade ago in Cuba. “These are my closest friends and two of the greatest musicians of my generation in Cuba,” he said. “We’ve played a lot together through the years, but this is the first time that we’ve toured and recorded as a working trio. When we play to together, something special always happens and I feel comfortable and free, because they know how my music works and where I will go even before I get there.”

The music of the Balkans, Eastern Europe, and most of all, Hungary are all showcased in the compositions of singer, songwriter, and violin player Edina Szirtes Mókus. She was inspired by earlier joint projects featuring the Modern Art Orchestra to compose specifically for a jazz big band, enhancing it with the sounds of bagpipes and a traditional Hungarian wind instrument, the tárogató.

"What does Ligeti mean to me?The intuition that there is something higher, more perfect than I could ever imagine, that there are connectionc in art, in the sciences, in the cosmos, about which he knows - and here my sentence breaks off." György Kurtág György Ligeti, one of the most influential composers of the late 20th century, would have been 96 years old on 28th of May.Le Grand Macabre (1974–77, revised version 1996) is the only opera by Hungarian composer György Ligeti. The opera has two acts, and its libretto – based on the 1934 play La balade du grand macabre by Michel De Ghelderode – was written by Ligeti in collaboration with Michael Meschke. Le Grand Macabre was premiered in Stockholm on 12 April 1978. In preparation for a 1997 production at the Salzburg Festival, Ligeti made substantial revisions to the opera in 1996, tightening the structure by means of cuts in scenes 2 and 4, setting some of the originally spoken passages to music and removing others altogether. The revised version was premiered in Salzburg on 28 July 1997, in a production directed by Peter Sellars. Ligeti’s (1923-2006) absurd-tragicomical masterpiece of the highest order blends popular theater, comics, pop art, cabaret, caricature and the Apocalypse with fascinating imaginativeness. The orchestra, for example, is enhanced with “instruments” such as car horns and doorbells. Ligeti himself called his work an "anti-anti-opera." The story unfolds in an imaginary land inspired by the famous Dutch painter Pieter Brueghel the Elder: Nekrotzar, the Grand Macabre, announces the end of the world; but in a land ruled by eros, alcohol and corruption, his plan to unleash the Apocalypse bursts like a soap bubble. The people continue to lead their lives as before and refuse to be frightened by thoughts of death and a dark future... LE GRAND MACABREOpera in two acts, 2011, 122 percA production of Unitel, Gran Teatre del Liceu, ZDF/3sat and ClassicaFeaturing: Symphony Orchestra and Chorus of the Grand Teatre del LiceuChorus master: José Luis BassoConductor: Michael BoderStage director: Álex Ollé, Valentina CarrascoSet designer: Alfons FloresCostume designer: Lluc CastellesLighting designer: Peter van PraetVideo: Franc AleuVideo director: Xaxi Bové cast:Nekrotzar - Werner van MechelenPiet vom Fass - Chris MerrittAstradamors - Frode OlsenVenus/Gepopo - Barbara HanniganMescalina - Ning LiangAmanda - Ana PucheAmando - Ines MoraledaBlack Minister - Simon ButterissWhite Minister - Francisco VasPrince Go-go - Brian Asawa

The Ligeti Ensemble celebrates its eponym, composer György Ligeti with an anniversary concert featuring works by Ligeti, Vivier, and Kurtág. Joining the Ensemble is star soprano Tony Arnold.

Odd rhythms, instant feedbacks, precisely calculated tracks and unexpected situations – the duo BpT celebrates the upcoming 50th anniversary of the moon-landing on their quite special way...  Members of The Budapest Turnarounds (BpT), founded in 2017, played in numerous groups of a wide range of genres – Smárton Trio, Santa Diver, Tárkány Művek, just to name a few – and they have already been playing at the Opus Jazz Club together, though just in an ad hoc trio fromation at the time. Since, the duo is developing their creative workshop and repertoire steadfastly so in addition to their initial astronomical songs quite new compositions will be performed this evening as well. facebook.com/TheBudapestTurnarounds  Love Concert by The Budapest Turnarounds

Pastell Contemporro was founded by pianist János Weisz and saxophonist Attila Borkó. The repertoire of the quartet consists mostly of originals. The compositions include elements of the Bartókian sound, built on combination of contemprary and folk music, as well as typical motifs from the American mainstream and fusion jazz. Besides their melodious themes and vibrant rhythms, their music is interspersed by energetic and versatile instrumental solos. facebook.com/pastell.contemporro

Zoltán Kalmár, born in 1976, played first in blues, rock, pop and funky bands of his hometown, Debrecen. However, right from the start, swing drumming has attracted him, after hearing Ed Thigpen, the legendary drummer of the Oscar Peterson Trio. He first played jazz with friends from Debrecen in 2001, and after moving to Budapest in 2008 he established his own mainstream jazz trio, playing gigs quite often with additional guest musicians. His present quartet of well-known Hungarian jazz performers is an organic consequence of this process. The music of the Zoltán Kalmár Quartet is based on legendary hard bop performers such as Joe Henderson, Cannonball Adderley, or John Coltrane. 

Each month, the members of Modern Art Orchestra perform the compositions of a legendary jazz record live at Opus Jazz Club. Released in January 1965 by Impulse! Records, John Coltrane's A Love Supreme became one of the most acclaimed jazz records, and contemporary critics hailed it as one of the important albums of post-war jazz. It has since been regarded as Coltrane's masterpiece, and by 1970 it had sold about 500,000 copies, far exceeding Coltrane's usual sales of 30,000. Coltrane, playing tenor saxophone on all parts, and leading a quartet with pianist McCoy Tyner, bassist Jimmy Garrison, and drummer Elvin Jones, recorded A Love Supreme in one session on December 9, 1964, at Van Gelder Studio in Englewood Cliffs, NJ. A Love Supreme, widely recognized as a work of deep spirituality and analyzed with religious subtext, is a suite with four parts: Acknowledgement (which includes the oral chant that gives the album its name), Resolution, Pursuance, and Psalm. One critic has written that the album was intended to represent a struggle for purity, an expression of gratitude, and an acknowledgement that the musician’s talent comes from a higher power. Nick Dedina wrote on the Rhapsody web site that the music ranged from free jazz and hard bop to sui generis gospel music in “an epic aural poem to man’s place in God’s plan”, while Rolling Stone called it a “legendary album-long hymn of praise” and stated, “the indelible four-note theme of the first movement, ‘Acknowledgement,’ is the humble foundation of the suite. But Coltrane’s majestic, often violent blowing (famously described as ‘sheets of sound’) is never self-aggrandizing. Aloft with his classic quartet...Coltrane soars with nothing but gratitude and joy. You can’t help but go with him.” source: wikipedia

Herbie Hancock apprentice Árpád Tzumo is one of the most versatile composers and keyboard players in Hungary who, both with his own formation SoLaTi, and as a regular member of a numerous groups, regularly performs at clubs and festivals both at home and abroad. This evening, however, he is introducing himself from a completely new side, since for the second time after a sold-out first concert in the BJC, he plays the drums instead of the keys. Tzumo's father was a well-known drummer, who worked with the legendary Attila Garay, among others, so it is hardly surprising that in his childhood Árpád was constantly “drumming around” at home, as he puts it. However, of course not neglecting the keys, he has begun recently to deal quite seriously with drumming. The result is Tzumo Drums Band, his newly formed quartet with well-known musicians of the Hungarian scene, playing a repertoire comprised mostly of Tzumo's originals.

Dear Guests, Gábor Csalog's March 3 concert has been cancelled due to health reasons. The new date for the concert is Sunday, June 2, 2019 from 6pm. Tickets are automatically valid for the new date or can be refunded by contacting Interticket as explained in the e-mail voucher you received by March 31, 2019. Thank you for your understanding: Budapest Music Center By inviting Gergely Fazekas to my piano recital series, I am hoping for a new type of dialogue between the music historian and the artist which might even involve the audience. Before and during the pieces, we will be able to consider parts and aspects of the music which speak to us. (Gábor Csalog)

“State-of-the-art jazz with a penchant for driving beats and fantastical composition. Highly recommended.”  Wiener Zeitung“A delightful, inventive, risk-taking, entertaining, moving musical export from Austria, crowned with awards and esteemed highly by international audiences.”  DrumHeads“…KOMPOST 3 creates bizarre, absurd musical landscapes. They use and abuse their instruments with such obvious enjoyment and imagination that one can only listen, smiling and shaking one’s head, eyes wide with delight like a kid allowed to open one present after another.”  Musikreviews The four members of KOMPOST 3 have been making music together since 2009; a project that began in a shared apartment in Vienna’s Third District and has grown into one of the most exciting young formations of Austria’s jazz and improv scene. The band released 4 critically acclaimed albums, won the international Bremen Jazz Award and the BAWAG P.S.K. Next Generation Jazz Award and has been touring throughout Europe, in Mexico and in the United States. Their upcoming album will be released in May 2019 and is once again a perfect example of the band’s ability to reinvent itself, while always being on the lookout for new sounds and musical ex-pression free of any blinkered mindsets. The outcome is a groove oriented blend of mesmerizing soundscapes riddled with avant-garde and progressive elements which will keep the audience on the edge of their seats. kompost3.at facebook.com/kompost3 instagram.com/kompost3music  Ballads For Melancholy Robots by Kompost3

We hardly need to present Gábor Juhász, the Gramofon and Artisjus Prize winner guitarist and composer, for the visitors of Opus, as he performs frequently at the club, most recently he played with his quartet at the end of January. About his present concert program he said: “Last year, at my fiftieth birthday concert, I wanted to avoid retrospection but the desire for it touched me a bit. Since then, I have been getting more and more mature with the idea of arranging some of my songs from the past 30 years for my trio, the most stable, most supportive outfit of my life so far. My colleagues were eager to support the idea. The program includes songs that were important at some time, at some of my projects, so I qualified them as of some account. I think we will present a quite exciting old-new repertoire at the concert.” juhaszgabor.eu  

When an outstanding soloist plays with us, the orchestra’s energy is considerably multiplied. Focusing on the three world-famous musicians, Gustav Rivinius cellist, Alexander Sitkovetsky and David Grimal violinists, Anima  Musicae Chamber Orhestra’s new concert series, Anima³ will be organised at Budapest Music Center’s stage. Having the prestigious title of „National Youth Orchestra” for the years 2018-2020, our guest artists play with us for the first time. David Grimal is a French violinist. He started to play the violin at the age of five. He won First Prizein violin and chamber music at the Conservatoire de Parisin 1993. He also enriched and deepened his musicality by studying with such personalities as Philippe Hirschhorn, Shlomo Mintz, Isaac Stern. David Grimal pursues an international career as a solo violinist, which has seen him performing regularly over the past twenty years in the world’s leading classical music venues and with prestigious orchestras such as the Orchestre de Paris, Orchestre Philharmonique de Radio France, Russian National Orchestra, Chamber Orchestra of Europe, Berliner Symphoniker, among others... In addition, David Grimal has for many years taken part in recitals with Georges Pludermacher. They have toured worldwide and their collaborative discography, which features works by Ravel, Debussy, Bartok, Franck, Strauss, Enescu, Szymanowski and Janáček, has reaped countless awards. In addition to pursuing his career as a solo artist, David Grimal has been keen to explore more personal projects. The liberty afforded by his collaboration with Les Dissonances has enabled him to develop his inner universe by venturing into repertoires not available to soloists.  

One of the leading pianists of the Hungarian jazz scene, Liszt-, Erkel-, and Gábor Szabó prize holder, Kálmán Oláh has gained international reputation as an artist who masterfully combines the elements of jazz, folk and contemporary classical music. Renowned for his distinctive compositional style and his original approach to playing jazz, Kálmán has appeared with scores of well-known artists including Lee Konitz, Randy Brecker, Steve Grossman, Jack DeJohnette, John Patitucci, Tommy Campbell, Ron McClure, Stefano Di Battista, Philip Catherine, Palle Danielsson, André Ceccarelli, Paolo Fresu, Kenny Wheeler and Ravi Coltrane, to name a few. Recently, at the end of March, Kálmán Oláh had a series of concerts at the most prestigious American jazz clubs  including Smalls in New York where he has performed several times earlier already. However, this time, instead of being invited as guest of a local musician, it was offered him by the club management to perform with local musicians of his choice. Thus at his concert at Smalls, Tim Ries, John Hebert, Johnathan Blake were the Hungarian pianist's partners. The successful concert was followed by a recording session, so the release of Kálmán Oláh's new US album is expected soon. The audience at Opus Jazz Club will meet this time the excellent piano player at a solo concert, playing mostly improvisations.

The Amadinda Percussion Group will be turning 35 in spring 2019. As part of their celebrations, they will perform a chamber concert together with the BFO. The programme at the BMC will feature two concert pieces, preceded by an exotic French opening work and followed by the Hungarian premiere of a piece by Steve Reich. Like listening to the excited song of an exotic bird, the concert kicks off with the concerto suite of the French André Jolivet, composed in 1965. The star of the piece is the brilliant flute. The comparison to the atmosphere of a distant land is no coincidence: the composer grew up on Montmartre, was attracted to cubism, esoteric philosophy and traditional African music, and travelled a great deal during his life. Amadinda has always placed great emphasis on American pieces. They established a close relationship with Lou Harrison and Steve Reich, with the latter composing several pieces for the group. Harrison was captivated by the music of Native Americans; he composed several pieces for gamelan ensembles, traces of which will be noticeable in his violin concerto (1959). The lyrical, colourful violin speaks with the percussion instruments, at times tense and rhythmic andat others soft and melodic in their tone. The percussion group brings to life flower pots, tin cans and water pipes. In his short, but often played, thickly woven flute piece, composed in 1939, Harrison makes full use of all the attributes of this instrument: he offers plenty of occasions for the highest notes of the flute to shine. The second half of the concert will offer Hungarian audiences the first opportunity to hear a 2005 composition by the first master of minimalist music, Steve Reich. Typical of the composer’s pieces, the work is repetitive and features the silvery sounds of four vibraphones intertwined with three string quartets. Their radiance is counterbalanced by the double-bass-like deep sounds of two pianos.

A key figure in the active Finnish jazz scene, pianist and composer Jussi Fredriksson joined forces with two renowned compatrots of him, bassist Jori Huhtala and drummer Mika Kallio, to create his trio. The trio’s first album ?  was an open question in musical form, while it’s counterpart !  – released on Jussi’s own imprint Fredriksson Music in fall 2017 in Germany, and during the spring 2018 worldwide – can be heard as a conclusion. The album’s six original compositions by Fredriksson highlight his ability to write energetic and forward-thinking pieces for the trio in the tradition of such minimalist jazz masters as Ahmad Jamal and Thelonious Monk. That being said, the band is on their own path, making music which is distinctively their own. Fredriksson has composed the music in Paris, where he spent a month a year before the release. “The sidewalks and galleries of Paris can be heard in the music”, Fredriksson says. “This is the classic Paris period every artist has at some point, I suppose. For myself the city offered a different kind of resonation for the creative thought, and thus opened up a new chapter in my personal songbook.” Fredriksson’s compositions have a highly narrative quality, which makes his musical ideas unravel in a surprising, yet logical way. The endings are often unpredictable, and the trio’s way to get there a joy to follow. At the core of the sound of the Jussi Fredriksson Trio is a strong sense of unity, and an understanding of how each player in the trio can bring their own personality in the music. Jussi Fredriksson (born 1980) is an influential figure in the Finnish jazz scene and beyond. As a musician, Fredriksson can be heard as a pianist/keyboardist in Jussi Fredriksson Trio and Nassaun Fasaani. As a drummer, he leads the quintet Fredator. Fredriksson is also an active concert organiser through his Flame Jazz project, which was initiated in Turku in 2011. He also leads the label Fredriksson Music, and works on various projects via the collaborative JazzHUG brand together with drummer Jaska Lukkarinen. In 2017, Fredriksson was elected to the Turku city council at the Finnish municipal election. jussifredriksson.com jorihuhtala.com mikakallio.net 

“This music is wild and thrilling and different and is overflowing with personality. I keep listening and listening and I’m still not sure what to make of it. But it makes me smile and the ensemble scores all kinds of points for pouring their heart into something so remarkably inventive and risky. Unbounded creativity. Pick of the Week.” Dave Sumner“HÜTTE plays a dynamic game with ones expectations. Once partially fulfilled, they are destroyed the next instant. (...) A band which fits perfectly to the whole contradictory coherence of Berlin.” Wolf Kampmann The Berlin based band HÜTTE won the Neuer Deutscher Jazzpreis 2013, released three albums – partly featuring a vocal ensemble – and played extensively on international tours, appearing at prestigious festivals like Eurojazz Mexico, International Jazz Festival Nicaragua, Managua Jazz Festival Guatemala, Jazz Festival El Salvador, Südtirol Jazzfestival,  Umbria Jazz, April Jazz in National Concert Hall Dublin, not to mention their countless perfromances at German festivals like Enjoy Jazz Festival Heidelberg, J.O.E. Festival Essen, Just Music Festival Wiesbaden, Jazz Units Berlin, Jazztage Regensburg, NueJazz Festival Nürnberg, KLAENG Festival Köln just to name  a few. They also staged a commission work, a tribute to the great British artist Robert Wyatt, for the Leipziger Jazztage in co-production with Enjoy Jazz Festival Mannheim, premiered in October 2018. “No other young jazz-band in the last years in Germany has caused such a stir as Max Andrzejewski’s HÜTTE” says the acclaimed German music critic Wolf Kampmann. The group of four strong individuals cultivate a playful, stubborn, passionate playing. HÜTTE is burning with strong melodious compositions, avantgarde swing and expressive freedom. After two successfull albums of the band extended with vocal ensembles, HÜTTE und CHOR (2014 Traumton) and HÜTTE and The Homegrown Organic Gospel Choir (2017 Whyplayjazz) the highly energetic and award winning foursome is now going back to the core quartet – and they play their asses off, as they proved on German jazz Expo of jazzahead! in Bremen, last year.

Péter Ajtai’s long-cherished dream came true with the formation of a group adapting music by Charles Mingus. Concerning Mingus it’s indisputable that we are dealing with an artist who is absolutely beyond any genre or classification, so it is understandable why does he enjoy the same respect in entirely different segments of the jazz scene. The members of the Mingus, Mingus, Mingus ensemble are well-known figures of the avant-garde music scene in Hungary, who don't play the music of Mingus note by note, but grasping its essence, try to shape it to their own face. The project is dedicated to the 40th anniversary of Mingus’s death.

Founded by Kari Ikonen (piano, moog - Finland) and Manuel Hermia (sax, bansuri - Belgium), Orchestra Nazionale della Luna is a modern jazz quartet, both rooted in the tradition of jazz and open to our time and all the horizons of our vast world. Both the moog and the bansuri expand the field of a classical quartet by inviting the sounds of India, Arabic music, as well as more electronic effects. Piano and sax are supported by the background of an intense rhythmic complicity between Sébastien Boisseau (double bass - France) and Teun Verbruggen (drums - Belgium), who share with the soloists rhythmic and melodic jousting, surprising at any moment. An intoxication of swing rocked by modernism, with the suspicion sometimes of a spiritual depth in the music, sometimes of quirky humor, almost Fellinian, are key features which make Orchestra Nazionale della Luna a musical meteorite quite unique. Preceding the concert, at the BMC studio, the quartet records the music to their next album, to be released in the beginning of 2020 on BMC Records. manuel-hermia.com kariikonen.com sebastienboisseau.com teunverbruggen.com 

 Details soon!

Ticket information coming soon! Dominga is a Tango duet created in 2013 in Buenos Aires, Argentina, composed by Violeta García in violoncello and Ana Micozzi in piano. Given its atypical formation in the genre they make their own non traditional arrangements searching a distinctive style and a very original sound. The repertory includes traditional Argentines tangos and new tangos. From the beginning they worked with the pianist and composer Hernán Cabrera (director of the Typical Orchestra Ciudad Baigón) to make the production of the first disc. They are currently presenting their first record called Chapa y Pintura. The CD was recorded in the studio Ideo Music with very important musicians of the current tango scene. Additionally, the duet is recording a second CD entirely built by new tango from female composers. During 2019 Dominga Tango will make their first European Tour performing in several cities in France, Switzerland, Hungary and Germany, among others. Chapa y Pintura by DomingaTango

The outstanding Hungarian cimbalom player and composer, Miklós Lukács, besides being involved in countless projects and groups, founded his own trio, Cimbiosis, in 2014. They have grown into one of the most original formations on the Hungarian jazz scene ever since. In addition to the unique line-up, the ever-expanding repertoire of original compositions, it plays a significant role in this fact that neither the leader nor the members have ever been afraid of experimenting and searching for new ways of expression. From the three albums released by Fonó Records, the latest, Lux et Umbra, was recorded, for example, with addition of winds, in a quintet line-up, moving musically to a direction of contemporary chamber music, while on their last Opus concert the trio performed even some Haydn adaptations! After the current concert, Cimbiosis will record up the material for their fourth album at the BMC Studio, this time again in the original trio lineup. According to Miklós Lukács, the new material will be a sort of contemporary-impressionistic music with fewer themes, longer musical paths, and many improvisations. Of course, Opus's audience will get a good taste of all this.

Krisztián Oláh Quartet fills a gap on the Hungarian music scene. Invited as first Hungarian musician to the International Jazz Competition of Thelonius Monk Institute, where the world’s 14 best pianists competed, Krisztián had the chance for a lot of new experiences in Washington and New York, during the time of preparation and the contest. These seriously influenced his life, including his musical world. With a very complex program of a mature voice that erodes his young age, he invites his audience to a special journey: his music, using present time’s full-fledged and expressive tools of jazz, reflects his inspirations from the musical heritage of the 20th or even 18-19th centuries, mostly inextricably rooted in Europe. Notwithstanding that the group’s program is based on Krisztián’s own compositions, the spontaneous and collective improvisation by the excellent young group-members, Kálmán Oláh Jr, György Orbán and Dániel Serei, makes an organic part of it, carrying inevitably the spirit and musical means of today, thus forming a fresh and complex sound for the quartet.

The Linda Kovács Recycle play songs of their recent album, Recycle, recorded at Opus Jazz Club and released last year on Hevhetia Records. "The special chemistry between the three musicians enables them to create a musical conversation across traditions - moving freely between styles without hindrances. Deconstructing musical boundaries through the re-interpretation of jazz standards and originals. Associations, reflections, free improvisation with a touch of electronics. It's music recycled."  facebook.com/Kovacs-Linda