Among the legends of contemporary Hungarian music, György Szabados occupies a special place that has made him, in his country and throughout the world, one of the most atypical voices of jazz and improvised music.
Born in 1939, virtuoso pianist and child prodigy of a family of famous musicians, Szabados was one of the first children to learn music by the 'Kodály method'. Considered to be one of the fathers of Hungarian jazz, which he clandestinely animated as early as the end of the fifties, he always approached this music with the filter of the iron curtain. The result is a very personal aesthetic, the rhizomes of which share equally their energy in jazz and their refinement at the heart of written music. We find mainly in him a Magyar heritage which, from harmonic researches of Bartók to the marked influence of Ligeti, intimate a color inimitable to its powerful improvisations. A style that still largely influences young Hungarian musicians.
The encounter with Joëlle Leandre sounds like an obvious as the universes resemble each other. Both have been able, through daring and determination, to impose their language and explore new territories freed from academicism. These two improvised music giants with multiple joint collaborations - from Anthony Braxton to Evan Parker - had never recorded together. In November 2010, this meeting took place in Vojvodina, the Magyar-speaking enclave of Serbia, hosted by Budapest Music Center.
This Live At Magyarkanizsa is a free tumultuous discussion of two verbal improvisers who carry the same word. The strength of Szabados' music is his ability to use all the resources of his instrument, from the rhythmic pounding that seems to whirl around the double bass to the small light sentence escaping from the maelstrom of the hammers, bows and strings. At his side, Leandre plays with a builder bow that is both urgent and solid, which visits the deepest abysses ...
Franpi Barriaux (Citizenjazz, France)

Track Listing

• Part 1
• Part 2
• Part 3
• Part 4

Additional Details

Label: BMC Records

Genre: Jazz

Run Time: 39 mins

Release Date: 09/30/11

UPC: 5998309301834