Artist database

23 June 1935 Lenti - 19 October 2025

He completed his maturity exam in 1953. Between 1954 and 1962 he studied at the Liszt Ferenc Academy of Music, where he was pupil of Endre Szervánszky (composing) and Zoltán Vásárhelyi (conducting). After 1962 he was music teacher, piano accompanist, conductor of chamber orchestras, besides contributor to concerts and documentaries.

Between 1971 and 1984 he lived in the FRG and worked as private teacher and freelance composer. As conductor and pianist he often played his own works. From 1984 he taught music theory in the Béla Bartók Secondary School for Music and at the Liszt Ferenc Academy ofMusic. Between 1992 and 1997 he was also head of the music theory department there. He habilitated in 1997 at the Academy and until 2001 he was chairman of the Master Board here (DLA). From 1997 he worked as contemporary music lector of the Hungarian Radio for ten years.

Since 1998 he was a full member of the Széchenyi Academy for Literature and Arts. The premier of his opera Sonnenfinsternis, requested by the Theater of Pforzheim, was held in Pforzheim (2000). In 2000/2001 he was scholarship holder of the International Artists’ House Villa Concordia in Bamberg. He was guest professor of the composing master course at the Summer Academy of Universität für Musik Wien (Reichenau, 2001).

His orchestral piece Leoniden – request of the Giessen Theatre Orchestra – was presented in 2004. He was invited as guest composer to the Kornsholm Music Festival in 2005 and composed his work Kornsholm Concertino just for this occasion. The same year he celebrated his seventieth birthday, so his works were played on many concerts in Budapest and in Kecskemét. His opera Der Hutmacher was presented 2008 in Regensburg, Germany.

Throughout his career, József Sári was awarded many times. He received the Internationaler Arbeitkreis für Musik Prize in Kassel (1984), the Bärenreiter Hausmusik Prize – also in Kassel (1985), the Erkel Prize (1991), the Bartók-Pásztory Award (1995, 2005), the title Merited Artist (1998), the Artisjus Prize for Sonnenfinsternis – four orchestral comments (2004) and Novellette No.4/b (2015) and the Kossuth Prize (2009).

József Sári passed away on 19 October 2025, at the age of 90.