Béla Bartók

Eight Hungarian Folksongs

Eight Hungarian Folksongs, Sz. 64, BB 47 () is a song cycle for high voice and piano by Hungarian composer Béla Bartók. It was composed between 1907 and

Composition#

The Eight Hungarian Folksongs were composed in two different periods. The first five songs were written in 1907. On this occasion, Bartók spent time traveling around Csík County in Transylvania and collecting folk music. The first song was collected in 1906, and the other four were collected in 1907. This was the first time Bartók decided to depart from his earlier primitive compositional style, as Bartók’s desire to educate the public was so evident that the melody in his folksongs was doubled by the right hand of the pianist (in which case, if there was an amateur singer or no singer at all, the melody could still be heard). These eight songs, despite being composed ten years apart, were the first example of Bartók not doubling the melodies, and he also followed that style in future collections of folk music. Since Bartók’s collections of songs were not meant to be played as cycles, but that the performer should rather mix and match them as Bartók also did at the time, Eight Hungarian Folksongs is not very well known as a song cycle. The set was first published by Universal Edition in 1922. However, the copyright was reassigned to Hawkes and Son in 1939, with catalog number B. & H. 18065.

Structure#

The set consists of eight untitled folksongs, although the title is generally taken from the incipit of each song. There are some conflicting publications about the scoring: while some publications call for voice and piano, the latest editions call for a high voice and a piano. The movement list is as follows:

Recordings#

Even though there is virtually no information on early performances of this cycle (and Bartók most likely handpicked some songs for separate performances in recitals), he did record the entire set, except for song 4, on 7 December 1928, in Budapest; Basilides Mária sang movements 1, 2, 3, and 5, and performed movements 6 to 8. The recording was released decades later on CD by EMI Classics.

Composer: Béla Bartók