Jazz English

Drummer Imre Kőszegi’s career has picked up steam over the past year. The top Hungarian jazz drummer has had a chance to present his international quartet on several tours of Western Europe.

For decades, Eastern Europe has been taken more as a satellite of the Soviet Union than as a campground for jazz.

The leaders of Hungary’s jazz clubs gathered together at the end of May in the town of Szekszárd. It was the third such summit of club leaders – the first conference took place in 1979 in Tatabánya and the second in 1981 in Szolnok.

The new board of the Hungarian Jazz Federation, led by drummer Imre Kőszegi as president, started a lively activity in the spring of 1992 with a unique project called “Celebration of Hungarian Jazz.”

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Imre Kőszegi, drums; Zbigniew Namyslowski, as; Jack Gregg, b; László Gárdonyi, piano. Recorded live, September 20, 1980, at the Jazzclub Henkelmann, Iserlohn, West Germany.

This year’s Budapest Spring Festival featuring drama, music and art was, for financial reasons, unable to include foreign jazz musicians. As a result, the three-evening event was devoted solely to Hungarian jazz. Featured were such top musicians as György Szabados, the János Gonda-Frigyes Pleszkán duo, and the Béla Szakcsi Lakatos-Gyula Babos duo. One concert highlighted a Hungarian-Yugoslavian workshop. The Benkó Dixieland Band provided entertainment at one of Budapest’s most exclusive restaurants for ten consecutive evenings.

Hungarian guitar player Sándor Szabó and his Belgian colleague Gilbert Isbin recently teamed up for a concert tour, performing in four Hungarian towns. Backed by tabla player Balázs Major, the two guitarists played a mixture of Indian, far-Eastern and European music. Their concerts were warmly received by the public. Sándor Szabó presented his new home-made “guitarvina”, a 16-stringed instrument combining features of the guitar and sitar.

The trio’s first album will be soon released in Holland.