Two New Hungarian Gramophone Awards
In 2013 two Gramophone Awards, considered the Oscars of classical music, went to Hungarians with ties to the Music Academy.
The nominees the international jury found most worthy of receiving the Gramophone Awards bestowed upon the best of the year included Barnabás Kelemen and Zoltán Kocsis in the Chamber category, and the album featuring Péter Eötvös from the concerto recordings.
The critics of the Gramophone Magazine, one of the world's most prestigious classical music magazines, have been presenting best record awards since 1977. This year the renowned experts and specialist critics chose the winners from 66 (6 per category) recordings the magazine had shortlisted from the discs of more than 800 candidates.
The newest list of winners was revealed on 27th August 2013, including the Bartók-recordings by Barnabás Kelemen, the violin professor of the Music Academy, and Zoltán Kocsis, voted best in the Chamber category. As for the Bartók New Series album titled Violin Sonatas Nos. 1 & 2, Sonata for Solo Violin, it was already highly praised in The Strad by Tim Homfrey just after its release on Hungaroton in May 2013.
"Barnabás Kelemen takes a muscular approach to Bartók's three sonatas (in this he is not alone). He and Zoltán Kocsis give an extraordinary performance of the First Sonata, full of fire and drive. They negotiate the multifaceted first movement with fierce and unflinching narrative propulsion. In the unaccompanied sections of the central Adagio, Kelemen is flexible, hushed and concentrated (albeit with rather a lot of breathing thrown in – the microphones are up close). The finale is a real tour de force, with Kelemen fizzing away on the G string."