Music of Hungary - Classical Music

Classical Music

Hungary's most important contribution to the worldwide field of European classical music is probably Franz Liszt, a renowned pianist in his own time and a well-regarded composer of 19 Hungarian Rhapsodies and a number of symphonic poems such as Les préludes. Liszt was among the major composers during the late 19th century, a time when modern Hungarian classical music was in its formative stage. Along with Liszt and his French Romantic tendencies, Ferenc Erkel's Italian and French-style operas, with Hungarian words, and Mihály Mosonyi's German classical style, helped set the stage for future music, and their influence is "unsurpassed even by their successors, because in addition to their individual abilities they bring about an unprecedented artistic intensification of the Romantic musical idiom, which is practically consumed by this extreme passion". Elements of Hungarian folk music, especially verbunkos, became an important elements of many composers, both Hungarians like Kalman Simonffy and foreign composers like Ludwig van Beethoven.

Hungary has also produced Karl Goldmark, composer of the Rustic Wedding Symphony, composer and pianist Ernő Dohnányi, composer and ethnomusicologist László Lajtha, and the piano composer Stephen Heller. A number of violinists from Hungary have also achieved international renown, especially Joseph Joachim, Jenő Hubay, Edward Reményi, Sándor Végh, Franz von Vecsey, Ede Zathureczky, Emil Telmányi and Leopold Auer. Hungarian-born conductors include Antal Doráti; Ádám, György and Iván Fischer; Eugene Ormandy; Fritz Reiner; George Szell and Georg Solti. Pianists of international renown: Géza Anda, Tamás Vásáry, Georges Cziffra, Annie Fischer, Zoltán Kocsis, Dezső Ránki, András Schiff and Jenő Jandó