Impressions of Vienna

[pchong]

Thanks for nice write up and insightful comments. Would you by any chance have any recommendations on Saltzburg?

[Costi]

Interestingly both Mr. Balint and Mr. Maftei are Romanian, learned and practiced their shoemaking craft in Romania and fled to Austria in the 1980's. To open a workshop in a European capital like Vienna, compete with the likes of Scheer and Reiter and be successful at it doesn't look like an easy enterprise.

[RWS]

Interesting; I would have thought "Balint" a Magyar name. Transylvanian, perhaps?

[Costi]

Indeed, the name is Magyar, but apparently Mr. Balint is a Romanian of Hungarian origins (nationality). I remember reading somewhere on the LL that he even used to manufacture the shoes in Tirgu Secuiesc (Transylvania). I don't know if this is still the case, but smoothjazzone, who visited his workshop a few years ago, confirmed that he was Romanian.
Mr. Maftei, though, and his wife (Mrs. Maftei - Barbu) are 100% Romanian, by name as well as by their own account on the website.

[RWS]

Thanks, Costi. 'Gives me hope that I may someday be able to resume my faltering study of Magyar! (Roumanian I try to understand through simple interpolation from French and Latin.)

[Costi]

Indeed that is a good method, but have you got any practical need to understand Romanian?
You were very brave to tackle Hungarian, I hear it all the time and never got to learn more than two words...

[RWS]

In an earlier career, I occasionally -- very occasionally -- came across histories or other literature in Roumanian, and I still enjoy a rare look at these and other writings. As for Hungarian: no real reason, apart from interests in the nation's history and in the dual monarchy, together with the appeal of the oddity of the language (which has yet to be enough to impel me to study either Basque or Turkish, though Finnish is on the list -- if I live far enough into my second century!).

[Sator]

I must say the only Hungarian I have picked comes from Bela Bartók. It does seem a rather difficult language since it is so far removed from Indo-European languages. Nonetheless, a skilled composer such as Bartók whose writing style makes the most of the speech rhythms of his native tongue, makes Hungarian sound quite exquisite. The results make Bartok's Blue Beard's Castle absolutely obsessively fascinating listening.

Although the title seems to announce what you might think are hammy and overblown operatic histrionics, the text to which he set music to is actually quite modern, and very subtle - a deeply introspective text with strong psychoanalytic overtones. With every door Judith opens, new and miraculous music is introduced. Tension builds as she fatefully makes her way to the final secret door that must never be opened. You expect a bloodbath at the end but instead the final scene emerges as a miraculously transfiguration of remarkable beauty - while the intense psychological darkness remains.

[Costi]

Did you see it staged, Sator? I only have the faint memory of a recording to which I listened once, but never saw it staged anywhere (then I am not very much of an opera lover, either, preferring vocal symphonic music).
Not meaning to be nationalistic, but the only Hungarian I picked from Bartok was from his Romanian Dances (ironically he was born in a town that is now Romanian...)
Hungarian is apparently not very difficult to learn, but it simply won't stick to my ears. I find the pronunciation very difficult.

[Sator]

I too seldom listen to opera, but when it is so well written as Bluebeard's Castle, I make exception. It is very rarely staged for whatever reason. I have yet to have a chance to see it live.

It is mercifully lacking the rather weak libretto and operatic histrionics ("oh please don't die Mimi blah blah!" ). Instead, the libretto is itself a minor modern masterpiece and could stand on its own as a staged one act play. It is based around the idea that men and women are forever doomed to misunderstand one another. Bluebeard is the stereotypical man caught up in his own masculine world, his castle, and Judith wants to open it up, and let the light pour into the darkness of the castle: she wants to snoop into its every little psychological nook and cranny. The skeleton's in Bluebeard's castle can mean many things - perhaps the baggage of relationships past.

But the symbolism can be understood in so many ways, making it all the more fascinating. The music is sometimes little short of mind blowing.

Pierre Boulez (Sony or DG), Bernard Haitink and István Kertész are the usual recommended interpreters on CD.

[RWS]

It was, in fact, Bartok's music -- to which my Viennese piano teacher (a graduate from the Imperial conservatory in 1913, and a far better teacher than my poor talent deserved), the neice-in-law (if I remember correctly) of Robert Musil, introduced me -- that impelled my first studies of Magyar: so extraordinarily different from the Romantic and Baroque music generally heard in my family, yet well within that honored tradition, that it was and remains both comprehensible and achingly mysterious.

And, yes, among Bartok's works "Duke Bluebeard's Castle", together with a few other compositions (the "Microcosmos", for example), stirs me most.

[smoothjazzone]

Sator said:

"Curiously, Balint does not believe in trial shoes. They don’t feel they are useful and will make a new pair up free of charge if the first pair fail to fit."

Absolutely true -- my pair fit reasonably well but were still slightly off in a few areas -- yet still wearable. When I showed them to Mr. Balint Sr. he was utterly horrified -- remeasured me -- corrected the last and is in the process of remaking the shoes from scratch -- which should hopefully show up in the mail in the next little bit. A refreshing change from the incessant whining I had to endure from one English shoemaker whose shoes never fit.

Balint shoes have the best make of any shoes I have seen to date -- and if the ill-fitting pair were anything to judge by, the fit will be perfect.

Will provide an update when the new pair show up.

BTW, I have had excellent results with Maftei -- lower in price and definately not as well made as Balint -- but an excellent shoe at a great price + the Maftei family are a dream to deal with.

My Materna last needs much greater tweaking -- will see them when I am in Vienna next -- Mr. Materna assures me they can fix any issues and if needed, re make the shoes.

[Noble Savage]

Curiously, I noted that the assistants always pronounce the store name as “K’nee-djar” rather than “K’nee-tzi” as one would normally expect in pronouncing German.

That's because Knize isn't a German name, but Czech, properly written today as Kníže, which might be pronounced in English as Kneezhe, and is a Slavic title of nobility meaning Prince, used as a family name, just like there is an English family name King.