For the Dutch original, please click here
Light,
wistful. Classical. Géza Frid got forgotten quickly.
Unjustly, three young musicians think.
At the age of six, the Hungarian Géza Frid was known as a child
prodigy and gave piano concerts in his native town Maramarossziget. An
international career, as pianist and composer, followed soon. He took
lessons from Bartók and Kodály, was friends with Ravel,
performed with world-famous orchestras and wrote later compositions for
Dutch celebrities such as Christiaan Bor and Emmy Verhey.
Because of the emerging fascism Frid fled from Hungary already in the
late twenties. The Netherlands attracted him because of the "odd
and for me constantly acute attraction of the Dutch girls", as he
wrote in his biography. After his marriage with the Dutch singer Ella
van Hall, our country became his permanent residence.
But no matter how popular he became in Dutch and international music life,
after his death he disappeared almost immediately from everybody's memory.
"I don't know exactly why," says the Hungarian pianist Martin
Tchiba (27). …
"His compositions have a high quality," Tchiba thinks. "Although
one can hear clearly how he let his master Bartók inspire him,
he is not an epigone. The music is fresh and original."
Looking for new music to distinguish himself with - "it is not interesting
for me to record for CD the umpteenth interpretation of a Beethoven concerto"
- he came across the works of Géza Frid. Born in Hungary, grown
up in Germany and frequently living in the Netherlands, Tchiba immediately
felt a bond with Frid. "In his works he combines Hungarian wistfulness
en East-European temperament with the lightness of the Dutch sense of
life." In order to do justice to that musical combination, Tchiba
was looking for the same Hungarian-Dutch balance in the ensemble he wanted
to record the CD containing Frid compositions with. This he found in Dutch
violinist Birthe Blom (27), good friend and stable music partner, and
in Hungarian cellist Ditta Rohmann (26), a good acquaintance from Budapest.
…
"Everybody falls in love with Frid's music," Tchiba predicts.
"For me that's a reason to see to it that his works sound again.
I feel responsible to revive this music that has been forgotten so unjustly."
For the Dutch original, please click here