In György Kurtág’s works tradition is not just processed or incorporated experience, but much more than that: constant inspiration, often acknowledged even in the titles, that together with his individual voice and personality has already made his music a classical example of contemporary music. Between September 19th and 26th a week of concerts and musicology lectures in the Cité de la Musique, Paris, will offer an insight primarily into the links between Kurtág’s music and that of Bach, but in the background of this portrait the faces of Schumann, Webern and Bartók will also appear.

"We have been working on it for eight years and perhaps we will never finish. The aim is, after all, to continue the dialogue between us." So wrote György Kurtág, Jr. on his and his father's joint composition Zwiegespräch in 2007. This piece, originally composed for string quartet and synthesizer, represents an extraordinary cooperation: a dialogue between two different artists, two generations and also between the sounds of tradition and new technologies.

The ninth and last concert of the project "Europe through the eyes of Russians. Russia through the eyes of Europeans" (organized by the Centre of Contemporary Music, Moscow Conservatory) is dedicated to the musical connections of Russia and Hungary. Along with earlier solo and chamber works by Denisov, Ustvolskaya, Bartók, Ligeti and Kurtág, new commissioned compositions by Nikolay Khrust and by László Tihanyi are to be premiered at Rachmaninov Hall on February 9.

Passport to Hungary is the title of the program to be performed three times in Chapel Hill and in Raleigh by the North Carolina Symphony Orchestra (conducted by SARAH HICKS) on 12th-14th January. The concerts are focused on compositions inspired by Hungarian folk music. Along with works by Kodály, Bartók and Ravel, Kamilló Lendvay's Concerto semplice for cimbalom and orchestra will have its US Premiere by PETRA BERÉNYI, who currently lives in Raleigh and is a devoted performer of contemporary cimbalom repertoire. The traditional Hungarian hammered dulcimer occupies an important place in the oeuvre of the 83-year-old composer - he uses cimbalom several times in his solo and chamber works and in his concertos as well.

… pas a pas … nulle part, op.36 written to the text of Samuel Beckett will be performed at Zipper Concert Hall at Colburn School on December 5. The day before a documentary film on the life and work of György Kurtág will be presented than followed by discussion with bass-baritone Nicholas Isherwood and a live performance of Kurtág's Hölderlin Lieder.

Three short pieces for viola da gamba will be premiered by Nóra Kallai at FUGA Budapest Center of Architecture on 4th December. The pieces dedicated to professor Joël Dehais were composed in 2008 and 2011.

The programme gives a selection of contemporary repertoire of the viola da gamba: besides works by Kurtág, László Sáry and András Soós will be performed brand new solo and chamber pieces by young Hungarian composers – Dániel Váczi, Péter Tornyai, Péter Zombola, Xénia Stollár and Georgi Sztojanov.

This book examines the impact place and displacement can have on the composition and interpretation of Western art music, using as its primary objects of study the work of István ANHALT (1919–) GYÖRGY KURTÁG (1926–) and SÁNDOR VERESS (1907–92). Although all three composers are of Hungarian origin, their careers followed radically different paths. Whereas, Kurtág remained in Budapest for most of his career, Anhalt and Veress left: the former in 1946 and immigrated to Canada and the latter in 1948 and settled in Switzerland. All three composers have had an extraordinary impact in the cultural environments within which their work took place.

György Kurtág’s recently finished work for nine instruments is performed by Ensemble Contrechamps on the 1st November together with the string quartet Officium breve in memoriam Andeae Szervánszky and works by Sándor Veress and the Swiss composer Roland Moser. The Brefs Messages op. 47 was commissioned by Contrechamps and dedicated to this ensemble and the conductor of the premiere Olivier Cuendet.

On 21 October the Ensemble Babel Lausanne will perform works by György Kurtág and György Kurtág Jr. in Budapest. The title of the program is “Found and invented objects” which is a reference to the core of Kurtag’s art that is the inspirations of the material and auditory world around us as well as of the canon of music. Also, the concert is the cooperation of the two rather different artists, father and son, which resulted in a piece composed as a joint work for string-quartet and synthesizer called the Zwiegespräch.

Five compositions will be performed by the Vienna ORF Radio Symphony Orchestra conducted by Péter Eötvös on 8 October. The program is on the one hand dedicated to Ferenc Liszt who was born 200 years ago and on the other hand presents the prize winners of the Gustav Mahler Composition Competition and the Hungarian Music Forum.