Az utolsó átváltozás

The way we look at time, passing and death varies from culture to culture. But the turning points in human life that are so important for personal time, such as birth, marriage and death, are crucial for all of us. Not so long ago, across the country, these occasions, including the days of 'the last change', were marked by a precise set of customs, rites of passage and songs, governed by tradition. Yet most of our society today has never heard a lament, never woken beside the dead, never listened for hours to the related folk songs that pray to Mary or recount the Passion of Christ.

What is the peasant image of death? What do the songs convey, and how do they relate to other rites through melodies and texts? During Lent, we will conclude our series of folk music open-air workshops with these questions, reflections and songs.

Guests.

The exciting journey through time continues, Szilvia Bognár invites you to a series of performances with live music, singing and song-learning

- who would like to wander through the world of Hungarian folk songs that goes back hundreds of years

- who is curious about the written sources of the melodies and texts

- who would like to have a glimpse of the fascinating process of preservation and change.

We have all heard about the oriental roots of Hungarian folk songs and folk music, about their transmission through generations, about their importance in the everyday life of the peasantry. Yet we rarely wonder how many centuries old this tradition is, whether certain melodies have their roots in the Baroque or Renaissance periods, or even in Gregorian chant. Moreover, as folk songs are spread by word of mouth, it often never occurs to us that some of the songs we know today - even in their variants - are preserved in period codices, manuscript hymnals, melodiacs, graduals, songbooks, or even hymnbooks.