Welcome back everyone!
I am sorry for the long lay off! Partly was that there was not much going on in my life in the month of January except staying in Budapest and keeping up with my practicing. Now since the school semester has started, I have now a little bit more motivation to keep on writing and keep everyone updated back home. Some of y’all were asking me to post again! So by popular demand, here is everything that I have caught up with!
Photo credits: Szeged Trombone Ensemble
In the middle of January, the Szeged Trombone Ensemble wanted to take some time outside Budapest and get some serious rehearsals in by going to our studio member’s lovely house in Csengele, Hungary. As you see can above, we had this home built studio in the upstairs floor and did lots of careful listening to each other and tinkered around with some recordings. It was very much a great way to build teamwork around each other and help improve our ensemble as well from an objective point of view. There is some exciting projects coming up for our ensemble and we are very much excited to perform in the Lille Trombone Festival in France this upcoming April.
I am very much looking forward to this trip! I have studied French for 2 years in my university and never gotten the opportunity to really help improve this skill. This will be the first French speaking country I go too and I am very excited to make connections and meet people through France. Also, to help improve this language skill I have been slowly developing.
Later in January, I performed in a orchestra project with the Liszt Academy with the Hungarian National Philharmonic. This orchestra is one of the most sought out orchestras in Hungary and has a deep history that is rooted within this country. Throughout the ninety-years existence of this orchestra, it has been breaking through with some of the world-famous soloists, and conductors in its time.
Coming to the Mupa Music Center for these rehearsals
The Monday night concert in the beautiful Liszt concert hall.
Photo credits: Nemzeti Filharmonikusok/ Hungarian National Philharmonic
The concert program was Beethoven’s 4th Symphony and Sergei Rachmaninoff’s 1st Symphony conducted under Geregely Kesselyak, principal conductor of the Hungarian State Opera. This collaboration was between the master degree students of the Liszt Academy being able to play a side-by-side concert with members of the the orchestra. This was such a wonderful idea as it gave us students an idea how a professional orchestra operates in rehearsals, management, and the standard of excellence it tries to achieve in performance. I learned so much especially from my principal trombone player, Robert Sturzenbaum, how to properly play in a low brass section. In addition, it helps to the matter that we were also playing a lot of great music and great moments for the trombone in this concert program. It was sold out concert and you can actually see the entire concert in the Youtube link I have attached to this post here below! The camera work and audio is the most professional quality you can imagine and it almost feels like I am watching a movie!
This past week, I just got done with a week long project with the Erasmus+ program that funded a brass ensemble from countries in the Eastern European area. This combined the low brass section from the Liszt Academy, the horn section from the University of Ljubljana, and the trumpet section from the Music Academy in Zagreb. We all took our bags to the beautiful country of Slovenia where we spent all of our rehearsals for 5 days .
University of Ljubljana where spent majority of our rehearsals
The university was right in the middle of the city center of the capital. In a way, the city the city center reminded me of the way the city center of The Woodlands was structured. In the Woodlands, there is a water way area that runs through much of the downtown area back home.
As you can see me crossing though these bridges, this is where much of the local and handmade shops for food, clothing, and goods the locals are able to buy. I was able to purchase some Slovenian wines and home grown honey that was made fresh from the vineyards and honeycombs from Ljubljana. Slovenia was made known to me that they have some of the oldest wines in the world and beekeeping has been a huge source for their economy. Beekeeping in a way is a sense of life for these Slovenians! It goes way back in their history as it has became the main source for their agriculture.
Outside the Concert hall in Slovenia as we took a cup of coffee through the gardens
Above my head is the famous Ljubljana Castle that was built around the 11th-12th centuries
During these brass ensemble rehearsals, they were directed by our tuba professor and composer at the Liszt Academy, Roland Szentpali. We performed some of his arrangements by Jean-Phillipe Rameau during our tour and commissioned 6 new pieces. The purpose of this project was to debut new music for brass ensemble with the collaboration of different nationalities and different performers. Once all the rehearsals were done, we took a tour through Ljubljana, Budapest, and lastly to Zagreb. I recieved class elective credit for my participation and wish projects like this were also implemented in the United States. I felt so exhausted from all the traveling we did, but was fortunate to finally see lots of parts of Eastern Europe and to make new friends from Slovenia and Croatia.
Zagreb, Croatia
The Music Academy of Zagreb
Lastly, during these past couple of months, I am really happy to say I met my wonderful girlfriend here at the Liszt Academy and have grown so much together through these past couple months! She has been with me through every step during my travels here and can not wait for all the harp and trombone duets we are able to make in the future ;) I am just really blessed with all the people I have met within my time in Budapest and want to stay in this magical place for the time being.
Zsófi and I after my concert with the Hungarian National Philharmonic :)
Looking forward to Valentine’s Day tomorrow and hope everyone spends their holiday with their loved ones too! As always, thanks for reading and looking forward to the next post!
Jason Wolfe
I’m so glad you have had this amazing opportunity! It’s been fun to follow your posts and see a part of the world I might never have seen.
Amazing times and places Jason! Love the pics. The best is coming up! Happy valentines day💕🫂