Kodály Competition

Categories: Competitions.

Jeunesses Musical Hungary has organized a knowledge-based competition for Hungarian teens aged 13-19 between December 2017 and March 2018. Not only musicians, or teens living in Hungary were welcome, but any teens who like music, who know who Zoltán Kodály is, including those teens living in Hungarian-speaking areas in Slovakia, Romania, Ukraine or Serbia.

The deadline for applications was Christmas 2017. 52 groups applied from Hungary, Slovakia and Romania. The kids worked in threes.

The 5 online rounds were held on the weekends of January and February. The online rounds corresponded with the 5 stages of Kodály’s life’s and were very knowledge-based, as being an online competition, there was no time for creative solutions. The kids had 60 minutes for each round. There were questions about Kodály’s life, his works (we provided the music samples), the kids had to recognize Kodály’s friends and peers on photos, etc.

The finals were held on the 3rd of March at the Hungarian National Radio’s Marble Hall. The 6 best groups competed against each other, but they started off on a blank page after the online rounds. The finals were recorded by the Hungarian National Radio and the recorded material was played on Bartók Radio the next day. The finals – now a face-to-face competition – contained interesting games, questions and creative solutions as opposed to the online rounds. The finals were also coloured with some performances by young artists, all Kodály of course. A group from Kecskemét won the 1st prize. The prizes were provided by respected musical institutions (e.g. concert tickets, summer camp), or they were things, that were attractive for the kids, like entrance ticket to the Sziget Festival, or Wizzair vouchers, etc.