Béla Bartók

o Bartók, the man
Bartók was born in the Transylvanian town Sânnicolau Mare/(Nagyszentmiklós), Romania, which was then in the Kingdom of Hungary.He learned to play the piano early: by the age of four he was able to play 40 songs, and his mother began teaching him at the age of five.He studied piano under István Thoman and composition under János Koessler at the Royal Academy of Music in Budapest from 1899 to 1903. There he met Zoltán Kodály, who would become his lifelong friend and colleague. In 1903, Bartók wrote his first major orchestral work, Kossuth, which honored Lajos Kossuth, hero of the Hungarian revolution of 1848.It was the music of Richard Strauss, whom he met at the Budapest premiere of Also sprach Zarathustra in 1902, that had the most influence on his early work. Soon his music began to be influenced also by the music of Claude Debussy that Kodály had brought back from Paris. His large scale orchestral works were still in the manner of Johannes Brahms or Richard Strauss, but also around this time he wrote a number of small piano pieces which show his growing interest in folk music. Probably the first piece to show clear signs of this new interest is the String Quartet No. 1 (1908), which has several folk-like elements in it.See also Bartók short bio here :http://pianosociety.com/cms/index.php?section=32
o Bartók's music
The most prominent characteristics of Bartók's music are the influence of the folk music of rural Hungary and eastern Europe and the art music of central and western Europe, and his changing attitude toward (and use of) tonality, but without the use of the traditional harmonic functions associated with major and minor scales.Bartók is an influential modernist and his music used or may be analysed as containing various modernist techniques such as atonality, bitonality, attenuated harmonic function, polymodal chromaticism, projected sets, privileged patterns, and large set types used as source sets such as the equal tempered twelve tone aggregate, octatonic scale (and alpha chord), the diatonic and heptatonia seconda seven-note scales, and less often the whole tone scale and the primary pentatonic collection.Ernő Lendvai analyses Bartók's works as being based on two opposing systems, that of the golden section and the acoustic scale, and tonally on the axis system.
See Wiki catalog of Bartók's compositions for a detailed listing :http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Category:Compositions_by_B%C3%A9la_Bart%C3%B3kor concise listings of his works, here :http://www.cc.jyu.fi/~tojan/bartok/bbworks.htm
o Music for Strings, Percussion and Celesta Sz. 106, BB 114
This is one of the best-known compositions by the Hungarian composer Béla Bartók. Commissioned by Paul Sacher to celebrate the tenth anniversary of the Basel Chamber Orchestra, the score is dated September 7, 1936. The work was premiered in Basel on January 21, 1937 by the Basel Chamber Orchestra conducted by SacherAs its title suggests, the piece is written for string instruments (violins, violas, cellos, double basses and harp), percussion instruments (xylophone, snare drum, cymbals, tam-tam, bass drum, timpani) and celesta. The ensemble also includes a piano, which may be classified as either a percussion or string instrument. Bartók divides the strings into two groups which he directs should be placed antiphonally on opposite sides of the stage, and he makes use of antiphonal effects particularly in the second and fourth movements. The piece is in four movements, the first and third slow, the second and fourth quick.The second movement of this work accompanies "Craig's Dance of Despair and Disillusionment" from the film Being John Malkovich.The third movement was also featured in the Stanley Kubrick film The Shining.Adapted from the novel of Stephen King, 'The Shining' puts tension at a peek only little horror but lots of suspense...The music of Bartók seems just have been tailor made to fit into the Kubricks movie, adding even more of a dramatic dimension to it.
o Sources and links :
Excertps from :http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Bela_Bartokhttp://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Category:Compositions_by_B%C3%A9la_Bart%C3%B3khttp://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Music_for_Strings%2C_Percussion_and_CelestaLinks :Bartók's partitionshttp://www.imslp.org/index.php?title=Category:Bart%C3%B3k%2C_B%C3%A9laKubrick's movie at IMDBhttp://www.imdb.com/title/tt0081505/Some music samples at Lastfmhttp://www.last.fm/music/Bartok= = =o Special thing :While fumbling around stuff about Hungary i also found this very special thing :http://visz.rsoe.hu/alertmap/woalert.php?lang=engA live updated world map of disastersweather events and accidents of allsorts. Provided by the :National Association of Radio-DistressSignalling and Infocommunications,Havaria Emergency and Disaster Information ServicesBudapest Hungary- -o Final word :This post was inspired by Joxley whoposted hungarian communist musicat Multiply the other day and by all thoseposting about music in movies.AAAaaaaaahahaha ;-)Universalis