Recollections of the teaching of György Kurtág

Maestro Kurtág and I have had the most extraordinary relationship in the course of more than half a century. The first encounter took place in 1974. I was rehearsing the Brahms A Major Sonata for violin and piano with Zoltán Kocsis at the Music Academy, when Mr. Kurtág came into our rehearsal room, listened to us, and then proceeded to completely demolish our so-called performance of that masterwork! This was one of the most prodigious music lessons I ever had in my life.

Our last encounter was three or four years ago in Budapest where I filmed an extraordinarily moving two days of rehearsals with the Arod Quartet, supervised by Mr. Kurtág’s prodigiously inspiring remarks. The repertoire involved was Bartók’s 3rd Quartet, and Maestro Kurtág’s own Microludes.

Then, finally, two years ago, I had a surprise! On my 80th birthday, I received from the greatest composer of our time the manuscript of a short piece for solo violin, dedicated to me! It is simply impossible to describe the  immense and ever grateful state of shock in which I found myself. It was simply unimaginable!