IN PARI – Lyrics and Music #4

IN PARI is a series where music is wedded to various branches of art. Equally paired, as indicated by the title of the series. On this occasion, the evening is about the connection between music and text. The texts of Lili Kemény, who gained significant attention and several accolades with her first novel entitled Nem, published in 2024, are paired with the music of cellists Bálint Bolcsó and Albert Márkos. As is customary for the IN PARI series, the performers arrive ready to improvise and react to each other’s performances. The evening’s dramaturgy is shaped by the back and forth of influences and, by the end of the production, we will have the impression that the genres were in parity, rather than being in a subordinate relationship. The curator of the IN PARI series is Albert Márkos.

Lili Kemény
Lili Kemény, writer, was born in Budapest in 1993. A volume of her childhood poems was published under the title Madaram by Magvető publishing house. In 2018, she graduated from the film director class at the University of Theatre and Film Arts. During her final years at the university, instead of filming, she worked on a monumental literary translation, translating David Foster Wallace’s experimental novel Infinite Jest into Hungarian with Balázs Sipos (Jelenkor, 2019). She suspended her doctoral studies (on collective film-making, specifically the film practices of Apichatpong Weerasethakul, Lav Diaz, Mariano Llinás and Albert Serra) in 2020 due to the model change at the SZFE University. Her manifesto novel Nem, which caused a significant stir, was released by the independent publisher su\cure-sale in 2024.
Photo: István Fazekas/hvg

Bálint Bolcsó Bálint
Bolcsó studied composition and electronic music in Budapest and Vienna before spending a year in Germany on a DAAD scholarship. His compositions are often built around unique situations, such as an improviser placed in an interactive environment, a concert organ controlled by a MIDI source, or an instrumental ensemble directed by a laptop musician. He frequently writes music for films, dance, and theatre performances, and also creates sound installations. He is an active participant in the Budapest free improvisation scene, and has released albums jointly with István Grencsó, Oliver Mayne, Bálint Baráth, Ádám Czitrom and Attila Gyárfás. He is a founding member of the Budapest Improvisers Orchestra, the Kamon Kardamom band, and the Hermina Creative Group. Since 2011, he has been teaching electronic composition at the Faculty of Arts of the University of Pécs, and at the Liszt Academy since 2014.

Albert Márkos
The composer and cellist Albert Márkos is a defining figure on the domestic improvisation, contemporary, applied and experimental music scenes. The Cluj-Napoca-born musician is also recognised as a film composer and as the creator of music for theatrical pieces. He is a member of numerous jazz and contemporary music formations and projects (Kassák, ARGO, budbudās, W.H. Shakespeare, Tractus, etc.), as well as the author of numerous significant contemporary music pieces. He is the curator of the IN PARI series.