Saturday, November 9, 2024 @ 6:30 pm – 8:30 pm CST
Thirty-five years after its dismantling, the Berlin Wall continues to hold a place in memory as a symbol of the Cold War. The collective output of a generation of writers, artists, and musicians on both sides of the Iron Curtain reveals a complex and often unexpected mix of conflicted nationalist loyalties, ideological optimism, and artistic triumph in the face of profound challenge. Guarneri Hall’s three-day festival commemorating the fall of the Berlin Wall in November 1989 will explore the music of the Cold War and its context through the socio-political lenses of both the west and the east. With the help of leading topical experts, each event will illuminate less conventionally understood aspects of the era’s music and provide a balanced view of the forces that influenced its composers.
About This Event
Hungarian composers György Ligeti (1923-2006) and György Kurtág (b. 1926) met as prospective students of Béla Bartók at the Franz Liszt Academy in Budapest in 1946. They became lifelong friends but each went on to forge very different artistic lives. In the wake of the Hungarian uprising of 1956, Ligeti fled Hungary and resettled in Vienna. He eventually took Austrian citizenship and would spend the rest of his life living and working in the West. Kurtág, meanwhile, chose to return to Budapest following his studies in Paris in 1957-58. Most of his creative output would come from behind the Iron Curtain.
University of Chicago Associate Professor of Political Science Paul Poast will provide context for compositions from Ligeti and Kurtág with a discussion of the Cold War politics in Hungary to which they reacted so differently, despite their deep friendship and shared values.
Program
György Ligeti: Homage a Hilding Rosenberg for Violin and Cello
György Kurtág: Officium Breve opus 28 (1989) in memoriam Andreae Szervánszky
György Kurtág: Six Moments Musicaux for String Quartet
György Ligeti: Horn Trio
Artists: Steven Beck, piano; Elizabeth Fayette, Maria Ioudenitch, and Adé Williams, violins; Brian Hong, viola; Alexander Hersh, cello; Nicolee Kuester, French horn
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55 people are attending Sounds of the Cold War: A Tale of Two Worlds
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