Professor Szabolcs Esztényi

	Professor Szabolcs Esztényi

Composer, pianist, improviser and teacher of Hungarian origin. He was born in Budapest on 20^th December 1939. He has lived in Poland since 1969. He studied the piano in Margerita Trombini-Kazuro's class and composition in Witold Rudziński's class (both diplomas magna cum laude) at the State Higher School of Music in Warsaw.
He has performed as a composer and soloist in Poland and abroad, taking part in many festivals (e.g., Warsaw Autumn, Poznań Musical Spring, Warsaw Music Meetings, "Musica Polonica Nova" in Wrocław, Łańcut Festival, the Witold Lutosławski Forum, the Festival of Polish Piano Music in Słupsk, Zagreb Biennale, Budapesti Zenei Hetek, Donaueschinger Musiktage, the Bergamo-Brescia Piano Festival, Festival d'été de Lanaudière in Quebec, Nordiskie Musikdage, Recontres Internationales de Musique Contemporaine Metz).
He has collaborated with many renowned performing artists including Jerzy Artysz, Andrzej Hiolski, Heinz Hollinger, Roman Jabłoński, Jadwiga Kotnowska, the Wilanów Quartet, Halina Łukomska, Olga Pasiecznik, Jadwiga Rappé, Zygmunt Krauze's Musical Workshop, Jerzy Witkowski, Iwona Mironiuk. He has given many first performances of works by Polish composers (e.g., Kazimierz Serocki's Pianophonie, Rafał Augustyniak's Variations on Paganini) as well as library recordings for Polish Radio. He has collaborated for many years with Ferenc Lantos and Mária Apagyi, authors of creative musical-visual pedagogy, and with the founders of the Free Artistic School in Pécs, Hungary.
Professor Szabolcs Esztényi has taught piano improvisation at the Fryderyk Chopin Secondary Music School in Warsaw and the Warsaw and Łódź Music Academies. Polish academic centres (Białystok, Bydgoszcz, Cieszyn, Gdańsk, Katowice, Kraków, Poznań, Wrocław) as well as several Hungarian institutions (the Ferenc Liszt Academy of Music in Budapest, the Department of Instrumental Education at the Debrecen Academy, Pécs University, Pécs Education Centre) regularly invite him to give illustrated lectures on creative music education and teaching improvisation. He takes part in piano improvisation courses for students and teachers of primary and secondary artistic schools. He has been lecturing and conducting workshops on piano improvisation at the Summer Master courses in Contemporary Piano and Vocal Music in Bystrzyca Kłodzka since 1996.
Szabolcs Esztényi won First Prize at the Polish National Piano Improvisation Competition in 1968. He was awarded a medal for the popularisation of contemporary Polish music by the Polish Composers' Association in 1988 and he received the "Orpheus" award for his rendering of Tomasz Sikorski's compositions at the 32^nd International Contemporary Music Festival "Warsaw Autumn" by the Critics' Section of the Polish Musicians' Association in 1989. In 1993 he was awarded the annual Polish Composers' Association Award.
He has been Professor of Musical Arts since 1998.

Compiled by: The Fryderyk Chopin Academy of Music