From the 12^th July to the 9^th of August, Budapest is experiencing one of the most acclaimed parties for its residents and tourists, this is Vajdahunyadvar Sumer Music Festival in Budapest, held in the courtyard of the Vajdahunyadvar castle. This festival has a great agenda that includes classical, swing, klezmer and gypsy music to enliven the summer evenings.

The functions are performed on Mondays and Thursdays, beginning at 20:30 hours. Prices range between 10 € and 20 € depending on the specific program. This year´s program includes a violin and piano concert by Beethoven, Brahms, Mozart, Vivaldi, Strauss, Tchaikovsky, baroque music, contemporary klezmer, gypsy music and zarzuela.

Music is a very important part of Hungarian culture. Just think back to the Romantic composer and virtuoso pianist Franz Liszt, as well as the pianist, composer, researcher and founder of the etno music, Béla Bartók, two major musicians who belong from the special bond between life and love for music, which is always present in the Hungarian culture.

This special love for music has its origins directly linked to the gypsy people, as you will be able to discover in the Hungarian Rhapsodies by Liszt written between 1846 and 1885. The Hungarian Rhapsodies are nineteen piano compositions that have versions for orchestra and for duets, in which Liszt music studied the jumps between tones, the absolute freedom of his music and his ability to feel and write his own notes.

Béla Bartók is one of the essential figures of contemporary music and the greatest Hungarian genius. Bartók earlier disclaimed from romanticism and took the sounds of music that manages to collect in a rudimentary phonograph, during his research in remote villages, where he sought the origins of Hungarian music. Then, he expanded his research to the Slovak, Romanian, Arabic and Turkish music, and included them in his compositions.

Zoltán Kodály is also one of the most interesting musicians of Hungary. His music evolved from the post-Romanticism to the search for new colors in the regional music of Hungary and Romania, which merges with complex mixes in his compositions. He worked with Bartók in the research of traditional music, while collecting more than 100 thousand songs. In 1907 he joined the Franz Liszt Academy as Professor, teaching music theory and composition.

These great men of the musical world music represent the special sensitivity of the Hungarians that will stay in the memory of those attending this summer event, which this year brings the best representatives of the music, and for the program Fugata and Orchestra, which has as artistic director Balázs Alpár with Veronika Harcza in voice and Miklós Szenthelyi.

Also, there will be the Chamber Orchestra and the Virtuosi Hungarians by the artistic director and violin soloist Miklós Szenthelyi with László Nyari, Mako Brigitta and Tünde Makó, who will be playing Vivaldi to close the festival.

For more information: http://www.vajdahunyad.hu/english.asp

 

Nancy Guzman

Music is great therapy, it helps to calm the spirit and gladden the soul. For this and other reasons, renting apartments in Budapest is the best idea for the summer, there you will be able to enjoy this traditional and unique festival.

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Theater had a realistic slope for many years. It was not until the late nineteenth century when it started to appear a change in this trend, mainly due to the various artistic vanguards and the advent of modernity. So, thanks to advances in visual media through symbolism and abstraction, theater took a step to higher levels of representation, staging and proposals. Today, contemporary drama uses a variety of new resources ranging from video, installation and increasingly minimal and conceptual staging, in which new records interact with aesthetic, political, current and controversial stories.

Perhaps the greatest example of total contemporary theater is the King Ubu by Alfred Jarry, a piece with multiple variations and recurring themes, works both the in stage and the subject matter from a political irony and humor truly amazing for its time. Jarry was a visionary, and as such, a precursor of Dadaism and other “isms” of the time. The curious thing about a piece like King Ubu, is that besides its high sarcasm, questioning the political environment of its time, anarchic and volatile capacity, is structured from the meaning and quite complex language games, in which the reader or anyone who witnesses the piece, simply get carried away by logic staged games. In this work, too, shedding is minimal nature of the staging of contemporary art.

Antonin Artaud took a step forward in creating theater. With his theories on the “Theatre of Cruelty,” Artaud not only proposes new means even more abstract and metaphysical included in the staging. It was after his explorations in Mexico with peyote in the Tarahumara tribes Theatre Artaud understood as a profound exploration of the unconscious, which also reveals a ritualistic nature scene on the set. So Artaud makes plays in their colors appear as substances, or occurrences that increased the volume on stage. What encourages Artaud is not stable look over the world, but rather quite the contrary. Artaud reveals the short depth of human spirit and the horror of the void, the inability to be present or be in the unrecognized breath by breath, no more than a pathetic construction of meanings around us, and that reality invention is also empty, no other culture density that gives, and which confuses us, contra lateral and manipulated.

The Contemporary Drama Festival Budapest has over ten years. During this period, there have been more than a hundred international performances in the festival, which each year continues to cause interest at the Hungarian public as well as internationally. The festival is a very interesting space in which new proposals for theater and performance converse, mingle, and generate new creations. For more information, visit the following website: http://dramafestival.hu/

Alexa Ray

Get apartments in Budapest and enjoy the best in current drama.

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Translated by: Hans
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The most extreme sounds of the German scene are probably electronica and metal. It´s no coincidence that bands such as Slayer, Megadeth, Anthrax, Metallica and Exodus, Thrash Metal greats, swear blind that the European crowd, especially the German one, is much more extreme than the American crowd. It´s so much so that in the 80s, after leaving a Slayer concert in Germany for example, you could find a sea of glass, broken bottles, metals and chains, as well as traces of blood of course, on the stages where this extreme band played. In the same way, the quantity of incredible thrash metal bands which have played in Germany along the years is very long, and some of them are already classics: Sodom, Destruction and Kreator.

The history of electro, in Germany, is also long. You just have to give one single name: Kraftwerk. Formed in Düsseldorf under the name of Organisation, later Kraftwerk, the voyage of this band begins with the most experimental Krautrock, with sweet and travelling sounds, until they became ´Menschmachine´, creators of techno before techno, and the rest of inventions which impregnated electronica in the following years. Of course that the debt of Rammstein with acts such as Throbbing Gristle or Einstürzende Neubaten is also, more than obvious. But in the case of these two bands, predecessors the the punk generation, the industrial and the experimentation looked to impact on lacerating levels with the staging and the use of non-conventional instruments, had more to do with a matter which faced the same terms as live performance, outside rock towards the performative.

Now, what Rammstein does isn´t exactly metal or electro, maybe something like rap. How to define a band which uses thunderous guitars, quick phrasings, industrial sounds and a German tone of voice which borders opera, to put it in some way. Rammstein today, is like an invention of the 90s, from the ´Trainspotting´ generation, and from the years that, for the first time, mainstream became in apparent honest communion with the industry and independent music, which actually never happened of course. Rammstein is part of the ´Neue Deutsche Härte´ movement, a term invented for the new genre which they were, supposedly, promoting with other bands such as Oomph!, Stahlhammer, Samsas Traum and Megaherz.

Today, the Rammstein experience is bordering parody, and in many cases it´s derisory. Rammstein´s passage in the musical industry, and with its supposed hard and industrial sound, isn´t but the answer that they´re still being distributed by a label like Universal. They´ve sold millions of albums and their apotheosic concerts, full of violent images, drama and special effects, are another live show which is interesting to see if what you want is, of course, that the musical media carries on constructing false gods, false images and generating more sales for artists who aren´t exactly new or refreshing. For more information on Rammstein and their tour, you can visit the following website:http://www.rammstein.de/

Alexa Ray

Get apartments in Budapest to be able to relax properly after the concert.

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Translated by: aleixgwilliam
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Autumn is usually that time of the year that is often taken for granted, to which no one pays attention to. What I mean is that summer is always a solid block of heat and high temperatures while winter is bitter cold, it snows in some parts and there are fewer opportunities to leave home. Spring and autumn move from one pole to another. But autumn holds the promise of the end of an era, the days transfer from heat to a more comforting temperature. During fall longer walks occur due to the nice cozy weather, riding bikes, drinking coffee on the streets or just smoking a cigarette while the leafs fall of the trees is a tradition practiced by many. The smell in the streets also changes, the dry tree leafs spreads through the air, after every step you hear the rustle of the leafs under your shoes. Transiting through the city becomes more peaceful and especially if you live in a city like Budapest, the influx of tourists and walking is reduced and the center becomes more comfortable and interesting.

Budapest yet, despite the large number of tourists coming to the streets, does not reach the degree of madness that places like Paris, London, New York and Berlin have during their summers. Summer in New York for example, is very uncomfortable with so many tourists on the subway checking their maps lost in the vastness of the underground, filling the streets of Times Square photographing every single moving object, eating junk, food. The Eiffel Tower in Paris fills with never ending cues of people, the Thames river is plagued by a line of people taking photos. But Budapest,  despite much of its tourism its magic remains intact. Imagine walking in autumn through the streets, feeling  the beauty of the people of Hungary, enjoying your meal in the temperate climate of autumn without any haste, strolling through the ancient and romantic streets this wonderful city has to offer its visitors

Another reason to be in Budapest is the Autumn Festival taking place in this city every year. During these days, Budapest is full of options You can listen to or see the best art, music, photography, sculpture, dancing and many more experimental arts and fashion as well as all the new multimedia technology. Exhibitions and film screenings complete this great event. This is a feast for any art lover or anyone who wants to know more of what is done today in the world of contemporary expression.

For more information, visit the following website : http://www.fesztivalvaros.hu/

Alexa Ray

Get apartments in Budapest and discover the wonders that this city has to offer during fall, along with its its vibrant cultural scene that has something for everyone. Do not miss this opportunity during fall, where it is also possible to find very comfortable flights and mingle with people on the streets more in talking mood than in a smashing bars one. Budapest Autumn magic just for you and your people.

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Translated by: Marc
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Festivals can also be a way to maintain the spirit of an important cultural tradition and keep it alive. Not everything is the market, industry and noise this summer, there are also options, although a bit more classic and traditional, that grant you the opportunity to enjoy with other people a different culture, or maybe yours, and learn a bit more and even enjoy with the family.

That´s how, the Jewish Summer Festival has been taking place in Budapest since 1998 thanks to the organization of the Cultural Centre of Jewish Tourism which is in the city. The centre of all festivities is no less than the Synagogue on Dohany Street, possibly the biggest and most spectacular synagogue in Europe. The synagogue isn´t just one of the most beautiful places to visit in Budapest but also an ancestral symbol of Jewish culture in the city. Much before they began to organize the festival, concerts already took place in this synagogue. However, it wasn´t until they had the initiative of this festival that the synagogue became a true concert hall. As part of the organization of the festival, one has to highlight that in 2006 they inaugurated the synagogue on Rumbach Sebestyen street to the public, built by the Viennese architect Otto Wagner, and therefore attracting even more visitors and public in general.

At the festival, Jewish culture is represented by different performances, concerts, exhibitions, open air programmes for the younger ones, crafts, book market and other artistic forms. As the centre of all events, the musical genre Klezmer is put forward. Klezmer is a genre that comes from the Jewish-Hebrew tradition from Eastern Europe. This style is played by professional musicians called klezmorim. The genre consists especially in dance and instrumental pieces for weddings and other celebrations. Although the genre has its origins in Eastern Europe, this style in particular has been developed more and was made popular in the United States during the Yiddish Jews immigrations between 1880 and 1924. However, little is known about the true origins of this folkloric music which is so unique and cheerful.

With the years, the festival hasn´t stopped growing and it´s still expanding. This year´s programme has renown international artists. Budapest is, undoubtedly, the best place for this type of festival. Its streets never cease to have an aura of light and charm during the summer. The walks in Budapest always become infinite and the options to have fun never end. This Jewish Summer Festival is just another occasion for which the city is visited by many more tourists, and not just Jewish ones. With every year that goes by, the city keeps becoming more and more cosmopolitan, without losing its traditional and romantic style. Maybe that´s why this festival is so welcome here. For more information and programmes of this event, you can visit the festival´s webpage and there you can also find information on tickets, artists and other activities.

http://www.zsidonyarifesztival.hu/

Alexa Ray

The best thing is to get apartments in Budapest and not miss out on the chance to be part of one of the most interesting festivals this summer. You can also meet beautiful people everywhere. Summer in Budapest is like a dream.

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Translated by: aleixgwilliam
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