Ligeti György fiatalkori rádióelőadásai

Kerékfy, Márton (2021) Ligeti György fiatalkori rádióelőadásai. MAGYAR ZENE, 59 (3). pp. 291-303. ISSN 0025-0384

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Abstract

Before his emigration in 1956 Ligeti took part in Hungary’s musical life not only as a composer and – from 1950 – a lecturer at the Liszt Academy. Between 1948 and 1955 he was also active as a music publicist, publishing 18 – mostly short – articles in musical periodicals, in addition to textbooks written in connection with his teaching activity. Except for two, these articles have all been republished in the Hungarian edition of Ligeti’s selected writings (Ligeti György válogatott írásai, ed. Márton Kerékfy, Budapest, Rózsavölgyi és Társa, 2010). Much less well known is, however, the fact that for a while Ligeti also regularly featured on Hungarian Radio, where he lectured on music. In the Hungarian Radio’s Sound Archives I have recently unearthed no fewer than 31 radio lectures by Ligeti. Unfortunately, no sound recordings seem to have survived (most of these lectures must have been live programmes), but complete typescripts for 26 lectures are extant. Ligeti gave talks on various topics, ranging from the folk music of foreign peoples to European Classical and Romantic music and from Bartók’s works to problems of musical analysis. The depth of these lectures, which were typically illustrated with music examples either from records or live, varied depending on the supposed interests and capacity of the target audience: there were programmes for schoolchildren, music teachers, and music- lovers. The typescripts of Ligeti’s youthful lectures are not only delightful to read – with an engaging and witty style not unfamiliar from the composer’s talks given in later decades – but are important historical documents too. Alongside Ligeti’s published articles from the period they form a corpus large enough to create a solid basis for the (re)evaluation of the formation of the young composer’s musical interests and artistic ideas.

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