Family and career choice

Balázs Kocsár was born in 1963 in Budapest in a family of musicians. At home, he became acquainted with the various trends of music culture, and thus contemporary musical language became natural to him. His father, Miklós Kocsár, is a composer, his mother Ildikó Herboly is a professor of singing at the Liszt Ferenc Academy of Music. Despite the family’s musical orientation, he was not destined to be a musician, although he excelled at the piano from childhood. At the same time, as his piano studies progressed, two phenomena persisted that predicted that he would not succeed as an instrumental artist after all. As a child and adolescent, he stubbornly resisted regular finger exercises, etudes and piano lessons. Instead, he loved improvising, finding sound groups, and performing well-known pieces in a variety of ways. Another difficulty was that he didn’t tolerate the performances well, and even very small audiences made him nervous.

Due to his interests, he first attended the Madách Secondary School, where he regularly took part in choir rehearsals. According to anecdotes, he enrolled at the Bartók Béla Secondary School of Music at the age of 18 just to avoid going into the army. This is contradicted by the fact that he majored in composition, graduating with excellent results, and at the same time he found his own later vocation, conducting. At the vocational school he was admitted to his father’s composition class, where he became friends with the composer Péter Tóth.

He had to consider several options before applying to the Liszt Ferenc Academy of Music, but for the reasons explained, he did not apply to piano. He began his studies as a conductor and singing teacher in István Párkai’s class, but, following Emil Petrovics’ repeated advice, he also majored in conducting in 1986. Alongside Ervin Lukács, his passion for a musical career finally deepened. In the year of obtaining his university degree, he knew for sure that he would become a conductor.

He came a long way from the point of being born into a successful musical family, he tested his skills, played in an alternative punk band as a rebellious teenager, and finally let events carry him away, he sensed the true nature of his talent.

It is a striking coincidence that the father, a composer with a rich oeuvre, did not write a single opera, and that his son, apart from a few alarming childhood experiences, had no interest in musical theatre until the age of 22. He recalls that he avoided opera for fifteen years, and was disappointed by some “successful” performances on Andrassy Avenue. In 1985, he visited Bayreuth with a choir from the Liszt Academy, where he was given an honorary to hear Parsifal and Der Ring des Nibelung tetralogy conducted by James Levine. The majestic performance had an elemental effect, and from then on operas were part of the young artist’s horizon. Yet his resistance was slow to melt away, and it was not until 1990 (in Szeged) that he began conducting opera. As much as the opera evokes the familiar world of childhood, it represents a new, individual path. The father provided accompaniment music for several theatre performances to which his son regularly accompanied him as a child. Thus, the world of the stage became a Proustian experience for him during his first real opera lessons. It is true, however, that, in the light of the spoken and unspoken expectations he had of it, opera was a musical domain in its own right, which he discovered far from his family roots.

Conscious decisions and the chance of commissions shaped the artist’s career in such a way that the operas he undertook one after the other could build on each other. Although every young conductor dreams of conducting the Ring, Balázs Kocsár deepened his skills in two completely different directions. He consciously began to nurture the heritage he had brought from home, the language of contemporary music, and he instinctively realised the importance of bel canto. This discovery gave him the extraordinary insight that enabled him to reveal the Italian musical dramaturgy of Wagner's first operas. Although not generally accepted today, his interpretation of The Flying Dutchman or Tannhäuser as bel canto operas is correct.

His native knowledge of contemporary music and the Italian “beautiful singing” style reinforced each other, making him one of the most sought-after contemporary opera conductors. Thanks to the “taste” of bel canto, audiences can enjoy the honest music of the present, despite the cumulative dissonances. However, it is important not only for audiences to approach the great music dramas of the 20th century from the perspective of beautiful melodies, but also for singers. The pieces by Korngold, Ligeti or even Alagna are performed in their own registers, but with the interpretation added by the conductor, they reach the audience better than a purely score-like musical performance.

Despite the initial resistance and numerous concert successes, opera became the defining feature of the conductor's career.

In 1989, he achieved his first success in Hungary at the 6th International Conducting Competition of Hungarian Television, where he won third place. The opportunities that came with the prize were also an incentive, but more important was the reassurance of his own career as a conductor. The aforementioned uncertainties and tensions during performances disappeared in this case too, and the presence of the orchestra, the jury and the audience only served to exhilarate him. It turned out that a conducting career can provide both internal and external security. As he later recalled, this was where his fate was decided. He attended master classes in Leipzig, Helsinki and Vienna.

He was given opportunities at the Hungarian State Symphony Orchestra, the Szeged National Theatre and on Andrássy Avenue. Then, based on his achievements in Szeged, he was offered a job in the family’s old town, Debrecen. For six years he held the post of music director for the first time. A series of challenges, numerous competitions and a daily work that demanded precision honed his style. This became evident in 1995 at the Franco Ferrara Conducting Competition in Rome, which he won. The first prize opened the door to many of Europe’s great music theatres (e.g. Cologne, Palermo and Liege), and the number of his invitations to perform increased considerably.

As a result of the competition results, his earlier dreams became a reality and he exchanged his Hungarian career for an international travelling conducting career.

During one of his stays abroad, he met Francesca Provvisionato, a well-known Italian soprano singer, whom he later married. Since then, the family has expanded with two children. In 1997, he settled in Italy for a long period, but two international engagements forced the conductor to travel constantly, he became a member of the staff of the Frankfurt Opera House and the Vlamsee Opera in Antwerp-Ghent at the same time.

In 2002, he was invited back by the civis city to conduct Lohengrin for the first time. The Wagner play was such a success that he regularly conducted operas at the Csokonai Theatre the following season. He was finally offered to be the director of the Debrecen Philharmonic Orchestra in 2004. After a year of organisational work, the Kodály Philharmonic was established, which includes the orchestra and the choir. With the merger of the two institutions, the city’s concert life was spectacularly boosted. Finally, in 2006, he became the director of the theatre’s opera department. Debrecen’s musical life was thus built on thoughtful, long-term and far-reaching plans.

The period up to 2011 saw significant changes. He also benefited from his foreign experiences when he succeeded in modernising the structure of the Philharmonic, when he provided new musicians and presented fifty operas. Operas by Mozart (e.g. The Abduction from the Seraglio, The Magic Flute, Don Giovanni), Puccini (e.g. Manon Lescaut, La Bohème, Turandot) and Verdi (e.g. Attila, Falstaff, The Power of Destiny) were staged, and the Csokonai Theatre was the venue for the original Bánk Bán and Hunyadi László. Contemporary music performances (e.g. Alagna’s The Last Day of a Condemned Man) and music history curiosities (e.g. Korngold’s The Dead City or Prokofiev’s The Fiery Angel) lined up. Mussorgsky’s Boris Godunov was received with great enthusiasm by the audience, and was performed in its original version for the first time in Hungary. Dvořák’s Rusalka, Smetana’s The Bartered Bride and Bizet’s Carmen were also sold out. He also revived Kodály’s popular song plays, Háry János and Székelyfonó (The Transylvanian Spinning Room). Some of these operas were also performed as guest performances on Margaret Island for Budapest audiences.

In addition to the hits, the concerts also focused on a number of valuable, rarely heard works, such as Liszt’s two monumental oratorios, The Legend of St. Elizabeth and Christus, which the composer deliberately wrote as Xtus. Long-overdue events took place, including Mahler’s Symphony No. 2 (in C minor), Beethoven’s Missa Solemnis and Orff’s Carmina Burana.

His work as a conductor was acclaimed, but one of the critics was himself. In addition to high quality performances, he also had to manage the institution effectively – in his own judgement, he did not punish failings too severely. In several public conversations and interviews, he indicated that he did not believe in dictatorial leadership. He insisted that singers and musicians should engage with heart and soul at every rehearsal/performance. However, this required far more than strength – it required empathy. Although he was critical of himself in this respect, the fact that the ensemble increased in numbers vindicated him.

In 2011, after many successes, increased audiences and a spectacular rise in standards, the city's cultural authorities did not renew the cooperation contract. He was not involved in the statements that erupted at the time.

He made use of his knowledge for the benefit of students at the Faculty of Arts at the University of Pécs. In addition to the concerts of the Pécs University ensembles, he created numerous opportunities for his students to perform. It is a rare gift that he is able and dares to work with orchestras that are just starting out in their careers, alongside the leading ensembles of Europe and Hungary. In addition to invitations from the major listed centres, he accepts many invitations from places previously unknown for opera performances. His work for opera in the countryside continues to stand out in his career, including the Opera Days in Baja, where two Mozart comedies have been performed so far. Beyond that, he has now become a teacher, working with “students”, assistants and instructing conductors.

In 2016, he was appointed Acting Music Director at the Hungarian State Opera House. In addition to conducting, he was again entrusted with the management of the institution during a period of major restructuring. His appointment was a testament to his career, but also to his courage to be critical of his own institutions. In his current position, he is responsible for the Hungarian Season, the Hungarian Heritage series and the renovation work – in addition to conducting The Magic Flute, for example.

He is credited with the original re-staging of Hunyadi László and Bánk bán. In each case, he dug into the original sources, but as a co-creative conductor, he also interpreted them. The results of his research were recognised by musicology and audiences alike. He also dedicated his inaugural speech at the Music Department of the Hungarian Academy of Arts to Erkel’s ancient versions.

His first exposure to Bánk Bán was as a spectator, but it discouraged him from the opera genre. He later had to teach it as a conductor, but only gave one performance of it. Later, after many years, when his experience as a conductor abroad had given him a mature knowledge of opera, he was willing to take up Erkel’s operas again. Before his performances of Bánk bán, Dózsa György and Hunyadi László, he spoke to other Hungarian conductors and the staff of the Erkel Complete Edition. He was liberated by his acquaintance with the ancient versions, and he sensed in them the importance of style hongrois and bel canto. The dramaturgical and musical solutions of the original versions became self-evident and beautiful as soon as they were freed from the reworkings imposed on them. Many original ideas were lost in the process of rewriting in several rounds. Although, in a given performance, all changes may have been justified, in the eyes of posterity they are now superfluous, sometimes for the sake of a singer, sometimes for the director’s own reasons, sometimes as a result of verism.

In his presentation at the Music Department of the Hungarian Academy of Arts, he showed how the original and the late Hunyadi differed from each other. He highlighted the way in which the bel canto dramaturgy of Erkel’s time was replaced by a much later, plot-driven, verism-imitating plot line. The version currently being performed divided the song-work, originally in four acts but structured on the logic of two acts, into three acts. In the opera, rearranged in veristic patterns, the proportions and thus the relationships between the characters and the musical structure were fundamentally overturned. Certain scenes were transposed, and thus internal tonal-logical steps were omitted, overlooked or even rendered meaningless.

The characteristics of bel canto give a new colour to the final scenes of Hunyadi, making it clear that the great scene of, for example, the palatine Gara was an aria with a one-themed recitative. He showed how the choirs lost their dramaturgical reality by not being given time to withdraw after the necessary recitation of the text (e.g. the meeting of Erzsébet Szilágyi and László V) He also pointed out that it was after the choral scene in the first act that Mátyás Hunyadi originally arrived, and that he then briefly summarised the events. He then sang cavatina and caballetta with the choir. In the rewritten version, Mátyás Hunyadi's scene has been cut out, so that the choir itself has to sing the events, and then, although the main character, László Hunyadi, enters – he is forced to begin with a recitative. In 20th-century dramaturgy this does not cause aesthetic problems, but in the logic of bel canto it is incomprehensible, because the protagonist appears on the scene for the first time with a grand aria.

Continuing this line of thought, he also pointed out that the individuality of the characters in the opera was also significantly damaged. According to the dramaturgy of bel canto, the protagonist is the character who sings the grand aria before the two grand finales; in this opera, it was Erzsébet Szilágyi. In pairing the main characters, he pointed out how László V lost his significance just like Erzsébet Szilágyi. László Hunyadi’s mother is silent in the rewritten finale of the second act, but the choir is unanimous in its praise of the king. Instead of a tension-filled final scene, the drama flattens out and Szilágyi becomes an incomprehensible figure.

Another serious loss is that in the original version, the king clearly fell in love with Mária Gara, and his actions from then on were driven by double jealousy, as the two Lászlós competed for Mária and for the salvation of the country. In the new version, the personality of László V is childish and soft, who has no chance in either the love or the power game. László Hunyadi also lost with the remake, as he did not have a single heroic scene left. The aforementioned Antrèja is recitativo, and in addition he sings four other songs, i.e. a romance, two duets with Mária Gara, and finally his farewell aria. He appears in only one dramatic situation (with Cillei), but even then he only recites. According to the transcript, he is not a hero of action but a sufferer. His heroic character is further ruined by the fact that in the 1936 version he has to sing the upper agenda of the thirds and sixths in a duet with his lover, a coloratura soprano. Although it is a vocal bravura performance, it is neither a dramaturgically nor musically fortunate solution.

The conductor therefore restored the original Hunyadi László based on the original sources and the Erkel Complete Edition, and returned to the music, text and dramaturgy of 1844. Success vindicated him.

He has now developed a strong image of conducting: a good conductor is one whose personality radiates music. In his opinion, no dictatorial method can achieve its goal. Control that causes convulsions, whether in an institution or an ensemble, can never bring people to a result that is compatible with art. In his view, the conductor must interpret the score – he must enrich the literature with his own reading. Instead of dictation from note to note, a modern and honest interpretation that is in tune with the sounds of the work and takes into account the composer's vision is the way to involve the audience in the magic of the piece.

He considers four masters as his role models: István Párkai, Ervin Lukács, Claudio Abbado and Péter Eötvös. His Hungarian teachers, István Párkai and Ervin Lukács were the last representatives of the great Hungarian conducting school. János Richter and Artúr Nikisch developed the sensitive, melody-centred conducting style based on German precision, which defined the world's conductors for a long time. This conducting style was also carried forward by Antal Doráti, György Széll, György Solti, Jenő Ormándy and the elderly Ernő Dohnányi. This common ground has made the five major American orchestras permeable to conductors. The precision, the precise, articulate expression, the inherent tempo and performance style of the avizos – all part of this tradition. As one of the last members of this school, he regrets that today this value is not really preserved by musical institutions.

However, another example was Claudio Abbado, who clearly led his orchestra with his charisma. This time, expressive movements were accompanied by an element that was barely tangible in its rationality: the musicality of personality. While leading, he also let them play. With the simplest of gestures, he brings the musicians alongside him, making music-making a collaborative effort. Hans Knappertsbusch was his role model in this respect. Abbado stands out among the great ones because the Hungarian conductor had the opportunity to see him performing live on a number of occasions. Carlos Kleiber’s strong conducting presence was only enjoyed live on a few occasions by him, and mostly he was able to study his activities on video recordings.

Of course, he also recognised the downside of the present idea. He said that orchestras that were usually conducted with a whip could easily fall apart if not conducted with a whip. This is a problem that needs to be tackled, and the precise tradition of the Hungarian conducting school helps a lot in this respect. Orchestras, sensing the effectiveness of rehearsals, quickly become partners as he strives to breathe with the singers and musicians. He has learned the working procedures and training techniques from Péter Eötvös. With him, he was able to put into final form the instrumental experience he had gained during his compositional training, as well as to polish the proportions of the inner sound or even the tempo build-up system.

His masters were István Párkai, Ervin Lukács, Claudio Abbado and Péter Eötvös, whose decades of experience he drew on to create his own style based on inner gestures.

Arriving into a family of musicians, after a long, self-critical boiling period, he consciously chose a career as a musician. After winning prizes at conducting competitions, he became a welcome conductor throughout Europe. In Hungary, he is mainly known as an opera conductor, although he has conducted more than a thousand concerts. His CD recordings prepared in Hungary were also composed of concert programmes.

This is how he continues to authentically convey his motto: “Opera is still an initiation.”

[2017]

Balázs Kocsár

Selection of works