A man walks up to the only other guy in a bar (wobbling) and asks if he could buy him a drink.
"Why of course," comes the reply.
The first man then asks, "Where are you from?"
"I'm from Hungary," replies the second man.
The first man responds, "You don't say, I'm from Hungary too! Let's have another round to Hungary!"
"Of course," replies the second man.
"I'm curious," the first man then asks, "Where in Hungary are you from?"
"Budapest," comes the reply.
"I can't believe it," says the first man. "I'm from Budapest too! Let's have another drink to Budapest."
"Of course," replies the second man.
Curiosity again strikes and the first man asks, "What school did you go to?"
"The Budapest Academy of Music," replies the second man, "I graduated in '04."
"This is unbelievable!", the first man says. "I went to the Budapest Academy of Music and I graduated in '04, too!"
About that time in comes Leos Janacek, a regular at the bar, and he sits down.
"What's been going on?" Leos asks the bartender.
"Nothing much," replies the bartender. "Kodaly and his buddy Dohnanyi are drunk again."
Not only did some of these composers live during the same time as each other, they knew each other well. Dohnanyi, before he came to the states, was a conductor and pianist who was a big promoter of Kodaly's works. Along with Bartok, who will be the next post, all these guys stuck together and were educated in the same country that they were born in. Interesting.
I think that it is safe to say that a pianist can have a great career and never play any of the works by the following composers. I don't even know any works by Kodaly, so with that said, let's move on to the other two guys.
Leos Janacek (pronounced Lay-O-Shh Yan-Ahh-Check) has a handful of works for piano. Three are crucial. The most important is his Sonata X. 1905. Check out the title - "From the Street". Doesn't that sound like an album by Ludacris or DMX. Amazing. It gets 4 stars **** from me for its unique sound and several great moments.
I found a decent recording of it CLICK HERE
So that leaves us with Erno. Well, the one set that he has that I thoroughly enjoy is his set of 6 etudes (Op. 28). The fourth one is a killer piece. It comes with one massive climax that is at Rachmaninov's climax level. Did I mention that it's in B-flat minor. Come on, what more could you want? Unfortunately I don't have a recording of this one, but I do have one of the 6th (more popular). This is very impressive. How about a recording . ? .
GAME OVER
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