Zoltán Gárdonyi

Zoltán Gárdonyi [ Zolta ː n ː ɡa rdoɲi ] ( born April 25, 1906 in Budapest, † June 27, 1986 in Herford ) was a Hungarian composer, musicologist and university professor. Zsolt Gárdonyi is his son.

Gárdonyi was already 17 years old studied composition with Zoltán Kodály, which was founded in 1875 by F. Liszt Music Academy of his native town. After further studies in Berlin with Paul Hindemith and Arnold Schering, he worked from 1941 to 1967 as a professor at the Hochschule für Musik " ​​Franz Liszt Music Academy" in Budapest. He led here also the Department of Protestant church music until its dissolution in 1949 by the then rulers and is now considered one of the outstanding figures of European church music in the 20th century.

His compositional output includes not only a wide range of church music genres and numerous orchestral works and numerous choral and chamber music. His musicological activity, largely thanks to the Bach and Liszt Research pioneering new insights. Zoltán Gárdonyi lived since 1972 with his family in Germany, and died a few weeks after his 80th birthday in Herford, Westphalia. The sustained international resonance of his music is documented, not least by the hundred first editions of his compositional estate and numerous CD - recordings that have since been published in Germany, Hungary, Sweden and the USA.