Marta Sebestyen & Muszikas

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Mártha Sebestyén & Muszikás

Album : Márta Sebestyén & Muzsikás

Performers : Márta Sebestyén & Muzsikás

Release date : 1987

Label :  Hannibal

Number of discs : 1

Total size : 60 MB

Total time : 00:43:04

Tracks :

1. Vetettem Violát  

2. Szeress Egyet, S Legyen Szép [Love Just One]

3. Három Árva [Three Orphans]  

4. Fújnaka Fellegek [Dark Winds Come]  

5. Hajnali Nóta [Morning Song]  

6. Egy Pár Tánc Mezöségröl [Mezoseg Dance]

7. Széki M Agyar a "Misié" [Misi's Szek Dance]  

8. Fuvom Azénekem  

9. Fehér Galamb Szállt a Házra [A White Dove Has Come]  

10. Teremtés  

@ 192 Kbit/s mp3

Most popular in the West as the lead singer for the Hungarian group Muzsikas (three albums are available from Hannibal Records), Marta Sebestyen has also released several solo albums. among them Apocrypha (1992), which collects songs from three Hungarian-only traditional albums recorded with Karoly Cserepes (Love, Christmas and Emigration). High Days was released in fall 2000.

- John Bush, All Music Guide

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Mártha Sebestyén & Muszikás

Blues for Transylvania

Album : Blues for Transylvania

Performers : Márta Sebestyén & Muzsikás

Release date : 1990

Label :  Hannibal

Number of discs : 1

Total size : 70,8 MB

Total time : 00:50:34

Tracks :

01. Betyárnóta

02. Istenem, Istenem

03. Kalotaszegi legényes

04. Szapora

05. Bodomkuti hajnali

06. Ősz az idő

07. Kati - Kata

08. Boncidai cimbalmos

09. Régi somogyi énekek

10. Régi lakodalmas

11. Ha felmegyek Kolozsvárra

@ 192 Kbit/s mp3

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Despite the best efforts of Romania's Ceaucescu dictatorship to make Transylvanian folk culture disappear, it survived at least in part due to the very deprivations (e.g., the lack of electricity and education) that were intended to destroy it. This well-known Hungarian quintet began rooting around in the one-time Hungarian territory a decade ago, and their first collection of Transylvanian tunes is a deep and diverse treasure trove of nearly forgotten centuries-old acoustic history. A droning hurdy-gurdy introduces a song about the "damned misery of love"; a pair of fiddles rouse dancers to high-stepping wedding and Christmas dances; a sad string quartet accompanies a song describing "The Time of Autumn" when conscripted soldiers left their villages. And, as with all Muzsikas's albums, Marta Sebestyen's wise and clear and cold voice re-creates another world in your living room.

--Richard Gehr

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Mártha Sebestyén - Apocrypha

Album : Apocrypha

Performers : Márta Sebestyén

Release date : 1992

Label :  Hannibal

Number of discs : 1

Total size : 108 MB

Total time : 00:47:17

Tracks :

1. Tavasz, Tavasz (Spring, Spring)

2. Piac Közepém  

3. Zugadoz Az Erdö (Humming Forests)  

4. András  

5. Bethlehem, Bethlehem

6. Ne Menji, Szivem  

7. Hegyen-Völgyön  

8. Apokrif (Apocrypha)

9. Szerelem, Szerelem  

10. Elment Az Én Rózsám  

@ 320 Kbit/s mp3

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Márta Sebestyén & Muszikás

The Rooster is Crowing

Album : Szól a kakas már (The Rooster Is Crowing) - Hungarian Jewish Folk Music

Performers : Márta Sebestyén & Muzsikás

Release date : 1992

Number of discs : 1

Total size : 56,4 MB (mp3), 209 MB (APE & CUE)

Total time : 00:40:54

Tracks :

1. Chasid Lakodalmi Táncok (Hasid Wedding Dances) 4:30  

2. Szól A Kakas Már (The Rooster Is Crowing) 3:06  

3. Máramarosszigeti Tánc (Dance From Maramureş) 3:36  

4. "Keserves" ("Lamenting Song") 1:59  

5. Ani Maamini (Ane Maamin) 2:56  

6. Most Jövök Gyuláról (I Have Just Come From Gyula) 3:04  

7. Szombateste Búcsúztató (Farewell To Saturday Evening) 3:11  

8. Szászrégeni Zsidó Tánc (Jewish Dance From Szászrégen) 3:07  

9. Hat Ein Jid Ein Wejbele (Hat A Jid A Wejbele) 1:59  

10. Széki Zsidó Csárdások (Jewish Csárdás Series From Szék) 3:59  

11. Chasid Tánc (Hassid Dance) 1:38  

12. Menyasszony Búcsúztató (The Greetings Of The Bride) 3:46  

13. Chanuka Gyertyagyújtás ("Haneros Halelu") 3:11  

14. Töredék (Farewell To The Guests) 0:38

@ VBR  mp3 + APE & CUE

The album The Rooster Is Crowing is a memento for the archaic Northern Transylvanian (Maramureş) Jewish community, destroyed by the Nazi in 1944. Their music has survived due to the Gipsy musicians playing to them in their feast. Márta and the Muzsikás have collected these melodies in the '80s from these old musicians, and two of them actually plays them in this CD in the same way they had done it fifty years before.

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[Oglo]

Szerelem szerelem i "Engleski pacijent"

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=9WYVr-qdAXU

[Јосиф II]

Пуно хвала за ову тему. Мој наклон.

http-~~-//www.youtube.com/watch?v=sZ_Q4VYwzyE&feature=player_embedded

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Muzsikás

Maramos, The Lost Jewish Music of Transilvania

Album : Maramos, The Lost Music of Transilvania

Performer : Muzsikás

Release date : 1993

Number of discs : 1

Genre : Ethnic

Total size : 56,4 MB

Total time : 00:49:14

Tracks :

1 Khosid Wedding Dance 4:33

2 The Rooster is Crowing 3:06

3 Dance From Maramaros 3:36

4 Lamenting Song 1:59

5 Ane Ma'amin 2:56

6 I Have Just Come From Gyula 3:04

7 Farewell to Shabbat 3:14

8 Jewish Dance From Szaszregen 3:07

9 Hat a Jid a Wejbele 1:59

10 Jewish Csardas Series from Szek 4:00

11 Khosid Dance 1:38

13 Haneros Halelu 3:11

12 The Greeting of the Bride 3:48

14 Farewell to the Guests 0:41

@ VBR mp3

Back in 1993 I saw an odd album by a previously-unknown-to-me Hungarian band called Muzsikás. Titled, "the Lost Jewish Music of Transylvania," it seemed likely to be, at worst, a different folky take on old Yiddish songs. Instead, it was my introduction to one of the most wonderful folk bands anywhere, and to the ethereal voice of Marta Sebestyén (whose own recordings are never so good as when she records with this band).

Even then, the melodies seemed more Hungarian than Jewish, but this is not a bad thing. Good Hungarian folk--and Muzsikás play it better than anyone--is an aural delight. The sawing fiddles and complex time signatures are intensely moving. The irony, however, is that the inflections are not Jewish. The difference is so great that during a discussion of "tradition as avant garde" on the jewish-music discussion list, someone put forward this album as a truly avant garde sound. I guess it is, in its way, as it isn't based on Jewish ways of playing, only Jewish notes.

Upon my arrival in Eastern Europe back in 1996 everyone hastened to explain to me how traditional Jewish music in that area was played Jewishly--not like that band Muzsikás did. It was further explained to me that they had simply gotten bad advice when they recorded. They should have spoken, with, say, Bob Cohen, formerly of the Budapester Klezmer Band, now of Di Naye Kapelye, in Budapest.

For all that, you can still hear the same core melody as on the Yiddish Theatre song, "Belz," as the band does "Jewish Dance from Szászrégen, and the "Jewish Csárdás" are a wonderful introduction to the Romanian tradition most akin to American bluegrass. Klezmatics fans will also hear an instrumental covered on a recent album of that radical roots klezmer band, here played as "Haneros Halelu".

This is a beautiful album. On their way to recover one thing, the band has created something different, yet wondrous, instead. Compounding the ironies, it is also one of the weakest of Muzsikás albums. So be it. It is also good that the band has rescued this repertoire. And, it is worth noting that the band continues to perform this music as they know it, and that it continues to sound beautiful and moving in concert. There is something magic in hearing Sebestyén introduce a Havdalah song as one of her favorite all-time melodies.

Reviewed by Ari Davidow, 7/19/97

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Márta Sebestyén

Dúdoltam Én

Album : Dúdoltam Én

Performers : Márta Sebestyén

Release date : 1993

Number of discs : 1

Total size : 98,6 MB

Total time : 00:42:58

Tracks :

01. Vetettem Violát (A Violet I Planted) Moldva

02. Széki Magyar, A ‘Misié (Misi's Dance From Szék) Mezöség

03. Fúvom az énekem (I Sing My Song) Gyimes

04. Fehér galamb szállt a házra

(A White Dove Has Come) Mezöség

05. Hajnali nóta (Morning Song) Kalotaszeg

06. Egy pár tánc Mezöségröl

(A Couple’s Dances From Mezöség)

07. Szeress egyet, s legyen szép (Love Just One)

08. Három árva (Three Orphans)

09. Fújnak a fellegek (Dark Winds Come) Somogy

10. Teremtés (Genesis)

@ 320 Kbit/s mp3

"Márta Sebestyén's first solo album features Muzsikás as her backing group and, indeed, largely follows in the mould of earlier Muzsikás albums. "Dúdoltam én" contains tracks with various approaches to Hungarian folk songs - the majority are performed with authentic traditional musical accompaniment, some have a modern musical arrangement and some are pure vocal performances with no music at all. The highlights of the album are the first and last tracks - both are among the finest of Sebestyén's career."

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Márta Sebestyén - Kismet

Album : Kismet

Performers : Márta Sebestyén

Release date : 1996

Label : Hannibal

Number of discs : 1

Total size : 105 MB (mp3), 266 MB (FLAC)

Total time : 00:46:15

Tracks :

1. Devoiko Mome (Traditional (Bulgarian)) 4:50

2. Sino Moi (Traditional (Bulgarian)) 5:44

3. Leaving Derry Quay / Eleni (Traditional (Irish/Greek)) 5:23

4. Gold, Silver or Love (Traditional (Bosnian)) 6:28

5. Hindi Lullabye (Traditional (Indian/Romanian)) 7:51

6. The Shores of Loch Brann / Hazafele (Traditional (Irish/Hungarian)) 4:31

7. If I Were A Rose (Ha En Rozsa Volnek) (Traditional (Baskirian/Hungarian/Russian)) 5:06

8. Imam Sluzhba (The Conscript) (Traditional (Bulgarian)) 6:00

@ 320 Kbit/s mp3 & FLAC

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This may not be her very best album; however that doesn't mean it's not glorious. Marta Sebestyen remains one of the world's most wonderful voices. Ghost-like, she steals up and takes you over. This time she's moved away from traditional Hungarian pieces (she's from Hungary, in case you were wondering) to sing material she loves from around the globe. So you get "Leaving Derry Quay/Eleni," a marriage of Irish and Greek, Indian lullabies, music of the Balkans, and beyond. It's all beautiful, a voice like gauze sliding over the music. This mix and match of cultures makes it a perfect American album. After all, this is the melting pot, the place of refuge for us huddled masses, where all are supposedly equal. The albums she made with Muzikas were transcendental. Now she's on her own, spreading her wings and finding she can fly. It won't be long before she can truly soar. After all, she's already crossing continents.

--Chris Nickson

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