Peter Eötvös, guest composer for Acanthes’ 25th anniversary, will preside over a special arrangement: three workshops with two musical ensembles, meeting the needs of the composers, the conductors and the composers whose pieces will be selected for performance.

The musical workshops will be based around the piano, flute and cello.

Acanthes 2001 will also be celebrating the Hungarian musical tradition. This is the “Year of Hungary in France”, so the Acanthes lectures and workshops will form part of official events. They will highlight the rich tradition represented by Peter Eötvös alongside Béla Bartók, György Ligeti and György Kurtág, continued today in the works of a new generation, which will be present in its diverse forms at the Chartreuse of Villeneuve-lez-Avignon

Peter Eötvös was born in 1944 in Székelyudvarhely (Transylvania). A gifted child, he was admitted to the Budapest Academy of Music by Zoltán Kodály at the age of 14. He moved form composing to conducting, his composing taking off more slowly than his conducting. People began thinking of Peter Eötvös as a composer in the 1990s; this is when he composed most of his works – over thirty to date – whose spirituality and intensity mark Peter Eötvös as a major contemporary composer.
Peter Eötvös’ composing is influenced by his sense of dramatics – it’s no coincidence that one of his best-known pieces is his first opera, Three Sisters. This permeates his repertoire: pieces for radio Now, Miss!, vaudeville (Harakiri), madrigal comedy, “performances”, and even his pieces for orchestra. Peter Eötvös himself feels that all his music is theatrical or cinematographic. While it does have some archaic features, when compared to Japanese nô or kabuki, or to African rites, it certainly doesn’t put the listener into the reassuring position of onlooker.
Perhaps this gestural touch, drawn out by an interaction with the acoustic space, explains the basic element of his music, which is so rare in contemporary music.
Adapted from Zoltán Farkas

Pierre-Laurent Aimard, born in Lyons in 1957, was a student of Yvonne Loriod at the Conservatoire de Paris, and was awarded, at age 15, first prize in the Olivier Messiaen Competition. At 19, enamoured of 20th century music, he became the pianist of the Ensemble Intercontemporain, remaining a member for 18 years, participating in many first performances. In the 1980s, Pierre-Laurent Aimard began to work closely with György Ligeti, whose Piano Etudes he performed regularly; some of them are dedicated to him.
Not only is Pierre-Laurent Aimard active in contemporary music circles, he is also often a guest performer for important international orchestras.
He currently teaches piano at the Cologne Music Faculty, and has often given master-classes, especially at Centre Acanthes.

Florent Boffard, born in 1964, studied music at the Conservatoire National de Région de Lyon and when he was 12, entered the Conservatoire de Paris, class of Yvonne Loriod, where he obtained his first piano award in a prestigious line of international distinctions (Claude Kahn Competition in 1982, Vianna da Motta Competition in Lisbon in 1983).
Between 1988 and 1999, Florent Boffard was the Ensemble Intercontemporain soloist and played in important first performances (works of Franco Donatoni, György Ligeti, Klaus Huber, Philippe Fénelon, Michael Jarrell, etc.) Recordings have been made of his performances of, for example, Structures pour deux pianos by Pierre Boulez with Pierre-Laurent Aimard, the Sequenza IV pour piano by Luciano Berio and the 2nd Sonata for Violin and Piano by Béla Bartók with Isabelle Faust. Florent Boffard has taught at the Conservatoire de Paris since 1997.

Zoltán Farkas, born in 1964 at Sátoraljaújhely, studied music at the Franz Liszt Academy, where he got his musicology degree. In 1987 he won a scholarship to the Musicology Institute of the Hungarian Science Academy, where he wrote his thesis on the Girolamo Frescobaldi’s Canzoni. He became first a member, then in 1997 deputy director, of the Modern History department of the Musicology Institute. From 1991 to 1994, he wrote music critiques for the daily paper Magyar Nemzet and the journal Muzsika.
Since 1994, Zoltán Farkas has been teaching at the Franz Liszt Academy in the church music section, while conducting research on Hungary’s 18th century church music and contemporary music.

Gabriele Faust began her music studies at Sarbrücken and Stuttgart and continued at Tübingen and Sarbrücken universities, combining them with literature and political science studies. As a composer she has naturally turned to the stage, cinema and radio (Hörspiel), and for three years was production assistant at the Opéra de Paris. She has produced many television programmes on contemporary composers (Holliger, Schnittke, Kurtág, Varèse, etc.). She also created the ancient music ensemble “Tibilustrium”.
As from 1994, Gabriele Faust has headed the “Music, Theatre and Dance” Arte department in Germany. She also works in the music section of WDR (Cologne Radio).

Walter Grimmer studied at the Zurich conservatory, and was awarded the diploma of the Swiss Confederation for teaching and virtuosity. He is one of the founders of the Bern Quartet. He has devoted a large part of his activity to contemporary music, and has given the first performance of works by Brian Ferneyhough, Helmut Lachenmann, Heinz Holliger, Klaus Huber, Isang Yun and Pascal Dusapin among others.Walter Grimmer taught at the Bern Conservatory from 1966 to 1987, and now teaches at the Musikhochschule in Zurich. He edited (in Germain and in French) Maurice Gendron's artistic testament, "L'Art du Violoncelle" (published by Schott Ed).

Sylvio Gualda is one of the most active musicians in the field of musical creation, and has worked on broadening the possibilities of percussion instruments. In 1968 he became first solo timpanist of the Orchestra of the Paris Opera. Many composers were interested in his work and wrote for him, particularly Iannis Xenakis.
As well as being a percussionist and teacher, he is also a conductor, and at the Centre Acanthes, he conducted the first world performance of Nguyen-Thien Dao, Les Enfants d’Izieu.

Camilla Hoitenga was born in the USA. She studied the flute with Alexander Murray, Marcel Moyse and Peter Lloyd. She has given solo performances the world over and has played at many festivals, for instance in Los Angeles (National Flute Convention), Donaueschingen and Salzburg. Eminent composers like Karlheinz Stockhausen and Kaija Saariaho have written solo pieces especially for her.
At present she is a guest professor at Essen, Germany, as well as at the University of Illinois, USA.

Zoltán Jeney was born in 1943 at Szolnok. He studied under Zoltán Pongrácz and Zoltán Kodály, at the Debrecen School of Music. From 1957 to 1961, he was a student at the Franz Liszt Academy with Ferenc Farkas. He then worked at the Rome Accademia di Santa Cecilia in Goffredo Petrassi’s class. In 1970, working with Peter Eötvös, Zoltán Jeney helped create the New Music Studio in Budapest.
Winner of many prizes (Ferenc Erkel Award in 1982, Béla Bartók-Ditta Pásztory Prize in 1988), he was appointed, in 1995, head of the Composition Department at the Franz Liszt Academy of Budapest.

László Tihanyi, born 1956, studied, at the Franz Liszt Academy of Budapest, composition with Rezsö Sugár and conducting with András Kórodi. Between 1978 and 1993, he gave classes in musical theory at the Béla Bartók Conservatoire of Budapest and has been teaching at the Franz Liszt Academy since 1979.
Conductor of the Symphony Orchestra of the Technical University of Budapest from 1980 to 1988, in 1985 he founded (and now conducts) the Ensemble Intermodulation, specialising in 20th century works.

Gergely Vajda, born in 1973 in Budapest, studied clarinet, then composition and conducting. On contact with László Tihanyi, József Sári and Zoltán Jeney, he began composing, and took private classes in composing and conducting with Peter Eötvös. Gergely Vajda has received several awards (Prize in the National János Richter Wind Instruments Competition, Artisjus Copyright Office Prize for Performance of Contemporary Music, Composition Prize at the Budapest Autumn Festival). He has often conducted the works of Béla Bartók, György Ligeti and Peter Eötvös, and has recorded the Folksongs of Luciano Berio.

Quatuor Arditti
Irvine Arditti, Graeme Jennings (violins), Dov Scheindlin (viola), Rohan de Saram (cello)
Several hundred pieces for stringed quartet have been created for the Quatuor Arditti since it was begun in 1974 by the British violinist Irvine Arditti. Among the composers who have had their works performed by the Quatuor are John Cage, Karlheinz Stockhausen, Iannis Xenakis, Mauricio Kagel, Elliott Carter, György Ligeti, György Kurtág, Wolfgang Rihm, etc. The Quatuor believes in working closely with the composer in preparing first performances. Another of its important activities is giving master classes, which it has often done at Centre Acanthes.
The Quatuor Arditti has been awarded many prizes, notably the Ernst von Siemens Prize in June 1999.

The Ensemble UMZE (Association for New Hungarian Music), created in 1997, has its roots in a chamber music ensemble which started in 1911 in Budapest. This was from the outset closely linked to the works of Béla Bartók and Zoltán Kodály. The twin aims of the Ensemble UMZE are to perform the major works of the 20th century and to inspire creation of new works, in and outside of Hungary.
After many concerts staged in Hungary (Budapest Spring and Autumn Festivals, Szombathely Festival of New Music, etc.), the Ensemble UMZE began its international career at the Akademie der Künste in Berlin and the ZKM in Karlsruhe.
Peter Eötvös is the "special guest conductor" of the Ensemble