The third residency that took place in 2009 saw Robert Farkas, a musician from Budapest, travel from Hungary to Brazil in February for a three month residency in Curitiba, the largest and most prosperous city in southern Brazil. Robert worked with a community choir hoping to increase understanding about Hungarian culture and music within the local community.

Learn more about Robert's residency in his blog

Looking back
26 June 2009

A month has gone since we came back. As I imagined, things got incredibly busy here after three months of being away. So – after we managed to wash and unpack everything and after saying hello to family and friends – we were instantly right in the middle of gigs, recordings, phonecalls etc. This is really the first day when I have the time to sit down and write this post – to finish our story and look back to our three months adventure.

Last week we did a little session of screening and talk to our friends about our trip to Brazil. They really enjoyed it but they admitted that they were a bit suspicious at the beginning – I am sure everybody has the experience of looking at boring holiday pictures of friends or family. We learnt a long time ago that whatever we see as tourist may only be interesting for us – this is not a transferable experience. But this is only true if you are tourists – if you meet real life, if you talk about real people and if you have stories to tell, it is a completely different case. And we certainly did not feel that we were tourists. For our friends our experience was very enjoyable – partly thanks to our artistic and fantastic little films, of course – but partly because we had stories to tell about Jenny, Maria Louise, Claudio, Joao, Lenita, Anina, Dulce, Ryff etc: all the marvellous people who we met and worked with during our stay. And they all were amazed by what we – especially Robi – achieved with the children. If one looks back to previous posts and listen to where these girls started from, it is really amazing how much they learnt.

Our whole idea was to show to an audience how great these kids were, that their work can be performed alongside professional musicians, and that they are able to entertain their audiences. They did a great job and all their teachers were very proud of them. Robi also invited his friends and – as the children did – he also showed how much he learnt on the guitar.

Curitiba is a very nice town to live in – it is safe, its people are rather cool, it is very multinational and the climate is bearable. It has some fantastic parks, good restaurants and a nice centre. Finally, on our last weekend we managed to be tourists in Curitiba and see its famous buildings and streets. Robi complained that winter arrived just when he left the city. It is especially heavy in Curitiba because it gets cold but it gets cold only for some days or weeks so people don’t invest in heating therefore the inhabitants are frozen for these days. Robi knew that it was time to come back to the summer in Hungary. We went to Ireland almost straight from Brazil where the weather was awful – cold and rain for the whole time. I was shocked – thankfully we had no such extremes while we were in Brazil.

Although life is happening here in full speed, we think a lot about Brazil and our fantastic three months there. We definitely want to return because we miss our friends and the music very much. Again, thanks for everybody who made this happen for us – we are very grateful. As I really enjoyed writing this blog, I may continue writing (not this one though) – this is really good fun. And we learnt to use a very simple film editing programme which is also great. Well, good bye.

Some videos of Robert can be viewed here:

Robert's musical influences come from his family. He first started playing the violin at the age of five and began to learn the piano shortly afterwards. When Robert was 16, he joined his father on a world tour with the 100 piece Budapest Gypsy Orchestra as the orchestra‘s youngest lead violinist and soloist. He now also plays the accordion and is currently learning guitar. Robert is the creator of Budapest Bar, an act that has quickly developed a cult following in Hungary by reviving music traditions of the 1930s and 1940s, introducing old songs to a new audience.

The HSBC Brazil Music Residency allowed Robert to learn about Brazilian culture, share his creative skills and compose new music. The residency was developed in partnership with the international music producers Serious. An established innovator of music that specialises in producing live jazz, international and new music events, Serious works with a host of partners around the world.

After accepting the residency position, Robert said: "I am especially interested in learning how to play new instruments and different styles of music. I am very proud of my culture and think gypsy jazz music, traditionally played in bars across Hungary during the 1930s and 1940s, is particularly beautiful. I am grateful to HSBC for providing me with the opportunity to share my culture with the choir in Curitiba and hope we will be able to create an exciting collaboration through the fusion of our cultures."

Samples of Robert's music can be listened to here:

Muzsikusnak dalból van a lelke 1930s - Budapest Bar (Improvisation of a 1930s song)

Celtic Gypsy Land - Magic Feet (a Scottish - Hungarian collaboration)

Rodav me - Romano Drom (Robert plays the violin and the accordian)