Tibor Szemző - Invisible Story 10"

At the beginning of his artistic career Tibor Szemző was mainly associated with the ensemble GROUP 180 from Budapest, which he founded in 1979 and very soon took on the role of an apostle of musical minimalism over Eastern Europe. Having obtained his basic musical training following the Kodaly concept of music education, Szemző graduated from the Ferenc Liszt Music Academy.There he met most of the musicians and future members of the ensemble, but his musical and general art universe was also influenced by the cultural explosion of the 1960s when he was a teenager –rock, blues, avantgard jazz, early minimalism and classical Indian music –than by the academic curriculum which included contemporary music. Although the GROUP 180 for which Szemző was a real “spiritual leader” worked as a very compact collective and rapidly gained the popularity of a rock band. His own artistic visions went further and in the mid-eighties he started to perform as a soloistas well. His broader musical background and original creativity came to full expression later in the nineties and in the following years he formed The Gordian Knot Company which was a very flexible and versatile group of musicians and some members of the Group 180 appeared there as well.

In the last few years Szemző has been revising some of his past recordings, rearranging, changing instrumentation, remixing and remastering them for new releases on vinyl LP on his FODDERBASIS label. Now he is releasing a new limited edition of the album “INVISIBLE STORY” on a 10’’ vinyl EP. The title refers to the collection of essays by Béla Hamvas (1897-1968) published in 1943. Hamvas was an outstanding Hungarian thinker even in the European context. Due to his anti-materialistic concept Béla Hamvas was deprived by the Communist authorities of publishing his works right after they came to power in 1948. Szemzőwas especially attracted by the essay Aquarius and incorporated the narration of parts of the text into his seven compositions of the album. Generally speaking the essay reflects the human condition and the lack of spirituality of modern man. It’s worth mentioning here that Szemző has been working with texts and spoken word from the very beginning of his artistic career and as on this album, the narration in Hungarian. His deep mellow voice and seemingly restrained reciting style perfectly matches the timelessness of Hamvas' messages.

The compositions are relatively short –the longest lasts six and a half minutes –and each piece has its specific instrumentation, although most of the the instruments used are mostly common seen in rock or jazz bands. Szemző, as could be expected by those familiar with his music, avoids any style clichés and uses different formative elements to create a very transparent soundscape which doesn’t interfere in this case with the spoken word, but underlines in a simple way the philosophical gravity of its content.

Compared to his previous albums the “Invisible Story” offers a different creative approach and thus is quite aunique item in the Fodderbase vinyl collection.

Edition of 300 copies

Alexandr Krestovský