♦ History of the Ensemble ♦

The Kobzos Ensemble was founded in 2006 to perform mainly Hungarian spiritual songs with instrumental accompaniment at the beginning. Later, the repertoire of the Ensemble has increased gradually, thus by now, apart from spiritual concerts the following can also be found: folk music concerts from different regions, dance-workshops (so called ‘dance-houses’) for adults as well as children, different workshops for children and early music concerts whose sets are made up of the musical themes from mediaeval Europe.

Our members have already been awarded different awards all and singular too, such as: ‘Young Master of Folk Art Award’, ‘Bezeredj Award’ of The Ministry of Cultural Heritage, ‘Béla Bartók Prize’ and ‘For the Hungarian Arts Award’.

Members of the Ensemble:

Andrea Navratil – vocal
László Demeter – koboz, vocal
József Szedlák – koboz, viola, mediaevel bagpipe, vocal

About our performances:

Most tunes of our spiritual concerts are part of the Moldavian ‘Csángó’ tradition (The Csángós are a group of Hungarians living in Moldva, which today belongs to Romania), because Hungarian spiritual songs could remain in their old original form mostly in this region, since this Hungarian ethnical group’s culture preserved, almost conserved characteristics and elements of mediaeval European music. All these archaic folk music themes with early music elements, which can be heard in our own interpretation and arrangement, give a handle to make some kind of synthesis and we hope they offer a new musical experience as well.       

Our folk music programmes are made up of folk concerts from different regions, dance-workshops (so called ‘dance-houses’), stage shows with dancing, tale-telling and / or song-teaching besides the music and different folk-art and ethnography workshops in clubs.

Our workshops for children managed by Andrea Navratil have been beloved by many people (adults as well as children) for a long while. They usually feature ‘dance-houses’, song-teachings, tale-tellings and handicraft workshops for children, often with playful lectures about our environment and traditional peasant farming.

Sets of our early music concerts are made up of the musical themes from mediaeval Europe which is complemented with a Hungarian musical repertoire of the later centuries as far as until baroque pieces. The performance is held with the use of period instruments, such as koboz, mediaeval bagpipe, fiddle, percussion.

Discography:

2009 – The Three Golden Apples
2009 – 'New King of new Star' (music and tale)
2008 – Bells of Heaven – Dzwony Niebios (live recording)

Contact:

László Demeter, tel.: +36 20 555 6277
Andrea Navratil, tel: +36 20 555 5995

email.: info@kobzos.hu
web: www.kobzos.hu