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{bahr'-tohk, bel'-uh}
Bela Bartok, b. Mar. 25, 1881, d. Sept. 26, 1945, was one
of the greatest and most influential composers of the 20th
century. A Hungarian, he studied piano and composition at
the Budapest Academy of Music, where he was appointed professor
of piano in 1907.
Embittered by the hostile reception of his early works, Bartok
began to collect Hungarian and other folk music. Until 1936
he traversed the Balkans, Turkey, and parts of North Africa
searching for indigenous material, and with his friend, the
composer Zoltan KODALY, he produced a series of important
studies, anthologies, and arrangements of folk songs.
During the 1920s, Budapest audiences became less hostile to
Bartok's music, and performances of his one-act opera Duke
Bluebeard's Castle (1911), and ballets The Wooden Prince (1914-16)
and The Miraculous Mandarin (1919) were well received. Bartok
traveled widely in Europe as a pianist, and in 1927-28 he
toured the United States.
The Piano Sonata of 1926 initiated Bartok's most fruitful
period, which includes the Mikrokosmos (1926-37); the Piano
Concertos Nos. 1 (1927) and 2 (1931); the String Quartets
Nos. 3-6 (1927-39, the most important contributions to the
genre by a 20th-century composer); Music for Strings, Percussion,
and Celesta (1936); and the Violin Concerto No. 2 (1937-38).
In 1940, Bartok went to the United States, where he remained
until his death. These years were full of disappointment,
financial hardship, and illness. Nevertheless, during this
time he completed the Concerto for Orchestra (1943), and nearly
all of the Piano Concerto No. 3. Bartok died of leukemia in
New York City.
The stark strength of Bartok's music, particularly the rhythmic
drive of his fast movements, derives in large part from his
affinity for folk music. His harmony is often dissonant, full
of irregular chords and tone clusters; many of his melodies
are based on the folk patterns of the pentatonic (5-tone)
scale. The characteristic percussive quality and novel tone
color of his music are achieved with traditional instruments.
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