The Budapest Philharmonic Orchestra is Hungary

Hungary

Hungary , officially the Republic of Hungary , is a landlocked country in Central Europe. It is situated in the Carpathian Basin and is bordered by Slovakia to the north, Ukraine and Romania to the east, Serbia and Croatia to the south, Slovenia to the southwest and Austria to the west. The...

's oldest functioning orchestra, being founded in 1853 by Ferenc Erkel under the auspices of the Budapest Philharmonic Society. For many years it was Hungary's only professional orchestra.

The orchestra is drawn from musicians of the Hungarian State Opera House

Hungarian State Opera House

The Hungarian State Opera House is a neo-Renaissance opera house located in central Budapest, on Andrássy út. It is home to the Budapest Opera Ball, a society event dating back to 1886.-History:...

 and the Hungarian National Theatre, and most of its concerts take place at the opera house. It has made numerous concert tours to other European countries, the United States and Japan.

Its first concert was on 20 November 1853, under Ferenc Erkel, the program consisting of works by Beethoven

Ludwig van Beethoven

Ludwig van Beethoven was a German composer and pianist. A crucial figure in the transition between the Classical and Romantic eras in Western art music, he remains one of the most famous and influential composers of all time.Born in Bonn, then the capital of the Electorate of Cologne and part of...

 (7th Symphony

Symphony No. 7 (Beethoven)

Ludwig van Beethoven's Symphony No. 7 in A major, Op. 92, in 1811, was the seventh of his nine symphonies. He worked on it while staying in the Bohemian spa town of Teplice in the hope of improving his health. It was completed in 1812, and was dedicated to Count Moritz von Fries.At its debut,...

), Mozart

Wolfgang Amadeus Mozart

Wolfgang Amadeus Mozart , baptismal name Johannes Chrysostomus Wolfgangus Theophilus Mozart , was a prolific and influential composer of the Classical era. He composed over 600 works, many acknowledged as pinnacles of symphonic, concertante, chamber, piano, operatic, and choral music...

, Mendelssohn

Felix Mendelssohn

Jakob Ludwig Felix Mendelssohn Barthóldy , use the form 'Mendelssohn' and not 'Mendelssohn Bartholdy'. The Grove Dictionary of Music and Musicians gives ' Felix Mendelssohn' as the entry, with 'Mendelssohn' used in the body text...

 and Meyerbeer

Giacomo Meyerbeer

Giacomo Meyerbeer was a noted German opera composer, and the first great exponent of "grand opera." At his peak in the 1830s and 1840s, he was the most famous and successful composer of opera in Europe, yet he is rarely performed today.-Early years:He was born to a Jewish family in Tasdorf , near...

.

Landmark events include:

• 25 March 1865: the first complete performance in Budapest of Beethoven's Symphony No. 9 in D minor, "Choral"
  Symphony No. 9 (Beethoven)
  The Symphony No. 9 in D minor, Op. 125, is the final complete symphony of Ludwig van Beethoven. Completed in 1824, the symphony is one of the best known works of the Western classical repertoire, and has been adapted for use as the European Anthem...
  
  
• 16 December 1870: the premiere of Liszt
  Franz Liszt
  Franz Liszt ; ), was a 19th-century Hungarian composer, pianist, conductor, and teacher.Liszt became renowned in Europe during the nineteenth century for his virtuosic skill as a pianist. He was said by his contemporaries to have been the most technically advanced pianist of his age...
  
  's Beethoven Cantata (No. 2, S. 68), conducted by the composer, written for the centenary of Beethoven's birth
• 19 March 1888: the first performance in Hungary of Berlioz
  Hector Berlioz
  Hector Berlioz was a French Romantic composer, best known for his compositions Symphonie fantastique and Grande messe des morts . Berlioz made significant contributions to the modern orchestra with his Treatise on Instrumentation. He specified huge orchestral forces for some of his works; as a...
  
  's Grande Messe des Morts (Requiem)
  Requiem (Berlioz)
  The Grande Messe des morts, Op. 5 by Hector Berlioz was composed in 1837. The Grande Messe des Morts is one of Berlioz's best-known works, with a tremendous orchestration of woodwind and brass instruments, including four antiphonal offstage brass ensembles placed at the corners of the concert stage...
  
  , conducted by Sándor Erkel
• 20 November 1889: the world premiere of Mahler
  Gustav Mahler
  Gustav Mahler was a late-Romantic Austrian composer and one of the leading conductors of his generation. He was born in the village of Kalischt, Bohemia, in what was then Austria-Hungary, now Kaliště in the Czech Republic...
  
  's Symphony No. 1 "Titan"
  Symphony No. 1 (Mahler)
  The Symphony No. 1 in D major by Gustav Mahler was mainly composed between late 1887 and March 1888, though it incorporates music Mahler had composed for previous works. It was composed while Mahler was second conductor at the Leipzig Opera, Germany...
  
  , conducted by the composer
• 8 April 1907: the first performance in Hungary of Liszt's oratorio Christus
  Christus (Liszt)
  Christus is an oratorio by the Hungarian composer and pianist Franz Liszt. The oratorio takes the traditional plot of Jesus Christ's life from his birth to his passion and resurrection, using Bible texts, and is thus somewhat reminiscent of another famous religious work, Messiah by George Frideric...
  
  (this was Hans Richter
  Hans Richter (conductor)
  Hans Richter was an Austrian orchestral and operatic conductor.-Biography:Richter was born in Raab , Kingdom of Hungary, Austro-Hungarian Empire. His mother was opera-singer Jozsefa Csazenszky. He studied at the Vienna Conservatory...
  
  's final appearance with the orchestra).

Many Hungarian composers have written works especially for the orchestra, including Erkel, Liszt, Goldmark

Karl Goldmark

Karl Goldmark, also known originally as Károly Goldmark and later sometimes as Carl Goldmark; May 18, 1830, Keszthely – January 2, 1915, Vienna) was a Hungarian composer.- Life and career :...

, Dohnányi

Erno Dohnányi

Ernő Dohnányi was a Hungarian conductor, composer, and pianist. He used the German form of his name Ernst von Dohnányi for most of his published compositions....

, Bartók

Béla Bartók

Béla Viktor János Bartók was a Hungarian composer and pianist. He is considered one of the most important composers of the 20th century and is regarded, along with Liszt, as Hungary's greatest composer...

, Kodály

Zoltán Kodály

Zoltán Kodály was a Hungarian composer, ethnomusicologist, pedagogue, linguist, and philosopher. He is best known internationally as the creator of the Kodály Method.-Life:Born in Kecskemét, Kodály learned to play the violin as a child....

, Weiner

Leo Weiner

Leo Weiner , was one of the leading Hungarian music educators of the first half of the twentieth century and a composer.- Education :Weiner was born in Budapest. He had his first music and piano lessons from his brother, and later studied at the Academy of Music in Budapest, studying with János ...

, Kadosa

Pál Kadosa

Pál Kadosa was a piano teacher and Hungarian composer of the post-Bartók generation. His early style was influenced by Hungarian folklore while his later works were more toward Hindemith and expressively forceful idioms. He was born in Léva. He studied at the national Hungarian Royal Academy...

 and Szokolay

Sándor Szokolay

Sándor Szokolay is a Hungarian composer and a professor of the Liszt Ferenc Academy, Budapest.-Life:Szokolay began his music studies in Békéstarhos. Then he attended the Franz Liszt Academy of Music, Budapest. His teachers were Ferenc Szabó and Ferenc Farkas. Between 1957 and 1961 he worked at...

.

Many renowned foreign composers have conducted the Philharmonic Orchestra in performances of their works: Brahms

Johannes Brahms

Johannes Brahms was a German composer and pianist, and one of the leading musicians of the Romantic period. Born in Hamburg, Brahms spent much of his professional life in Vienna, Austria, where he was a leader of the musical scene...

, Dvořák

Antonín Dvorák

Antonín Leopold Dvořák was a Czech composer of late Romantic music, who employed the idioms of the folk music of Moravia and his native Bohemia. Dvořák’s own style is sometimes called "romantic-classicist synthesis". His works include symphonic, choral and chamber music, concerti, operas and many...

, Mahler, Mascagni

Pietro Mascagni

Pietro Antonio Stefano Mascagni was an Italian composer most noted for his operas. His 1890 masterpiece Cavalleria rusticana caused one of the greatest sensations in opera history and single-handedly ushered in the Verismo movement in Italian dramatic music...

, Prokofiev

Sergei Prokofiev

Sergei Sergeyevich Prokofiev was a Russian composer, pianist and conductor who mastered numerous musical genres and is regarded as one of the major composers of the 20th century...

, Ravel

Maurice Ravel

Joseph-Maurice Ravel was a French composer known especially for his melodies, orchestral and instrumental textures and effects...

, Respighi

Ottorino Respighi

Ottorino Respighi was an Italian composer, musicologist and conductor. He is best known for his orchestral "Roman trilogy": Fountains of Rome ; Pines of Rome ; and Roman Festivals...

, Richard Strauss

Richard Strauss

Richard Georg Strauss was a leading German composer of the late Romantic and early modern eras. He is known for his operas, which include Der Rosenkavalier and Salome; his Lieder, especially his Four Last Songs; and his tone poems and orchestral works, such as Death and Transfiguration, Till...

 and Stravinsky

Igor Stravinsky

Igor Fyodorovich Stravinsky ; 6 April 1971) was a Russian, later naturalized French, and then naturalized American composer, pianist, and conductor....

. Other conductors to appear with the orchestra include Eugen d'Albert

Eugen d'Albert

Eugen Francis Charles d'Albert was a Scottish-born German pianist and composer.Educated in Britain, d'Albert showed early musical talent and, at the age of seventeen, he won a scholarship to study in Austria...

, Édouard Colonne

Édouard Colonne

Édouard Juda Colonne was a French conductor and violinist, who was a champion of the music of Berlioz and other eminent 19th-century composers.-Life and career:...

, Arthur Nikisch

Arthur Nikisch

Arthur Nikisch ; 12 October 185523 January 1922) was a Hungarian conductor who performed internationally, holding posts in Boston, London and - most importantly - Berlin. He was considered an outstanding interpreter of the music of Bruckner, Tchaikovsky, Beethoven and Liszt...

, Gabriel Pierné

Gabriel Pierné

Henri Constant Gabriel Pierné was a French composer, conductor, and organist.-Biography:Gabriel Pierné was born in Metz in 1863. His family moved to Paris to escape the Franco-Prussian War. He studied at the Paris Conservatoire, gaining first prizes for solfège, piano, organ, counterpoint and fugue...

, Felix Weingartner

Felix Weingartner

Paul Felix von Weingartner, Edler von Münzberg was an Austrian conductor, composer and pianist.-Biography:...

, Bruno Walter

Bruno Walter

Bruno Walter was a German-born conductor. He is considered one of the best known conductors of the 20th century. Walter was born in Berlin, but is known to have lived in several countries between 1933 and 1939, before finally settling in the United States in 1939...

, Erich Kleiber

Erich Kleiber

Erich Kleiber was an Austrian conductor.- Biography :Born in Vienna, Kleiber studied in Prague...

 and Otto Klemperer

Otto Klemperer

Otto Klemperer was a German conductor and composer. He is widely regarded as one of the leading conductors of the 20th century.-Biography:Otto Klemperer was born in Breslau, Silesia Province, then in Germany...

, .

Chairmen-conductors

The chairmen-conductors of the orchestra have been:

• 1835-1871: Ferenc Erkel
• 1875-1900: Sándor Erkel (Ferenc Erkel's son)
• 1900-1918: István Kerner
• 1918-1943: Ernő Dohnányi
  Erno Dohnányi
  Ernő Dohnányi was a Hungarian conductor, composer, and pianist. He used the German form of his name Ernst von Dohnányi for most of his published compositions....
  
  
• 1960-1967: János Ferencsik
  János Ferencsik
  János Ferencsik was a Hungarian conductor.Ferencsik was born in Budapest; he actively played music even as a very young boy. He took violin lessons and taught himself to play the organ. He studied at the National Conservatory of Music in Budapest, where his major subjects were organ performance...
  
  
• 1967-1986: András Kóródi
• 1989-1994: Erich Bergel
  Erich Bergel
  Erich Bergel was a conductor from Transylvania .-Professional career:Bergel was a flutist of the Hermannstädter Philharmoniker age 18. From 1950 to 1955 he studied conducting, organ and composition at the Gheorghe Dima Music Academy of Cluj-Napoca...
  
  
• 1997-current: Rico Saccani
  Rico Saccani
  Rico Saccani is an Italian conductor who served as Music Director/Artistic Adviser of the Budapest Philharmonic Orchestra between 1996 and 2005 and was principal guest conductor of the Hungarian State Opera from 1985 to 2005.-Biography:...
  
  .