Máté Bella

composer

"The unusual, the peculiar became an experience! Those present will have certainly learned for a lifetime the name Máté Bella."

— Katalin Fittler

The Nights monologue

National Theatre, 2013

"…attempting the impossible, and as a whole tries to capture Mihály Vörösmarty’s poetic and philosophical vision into the world of darkness and the cycle of an eternal return. The composition (which was the composer’s 2011 graduation concert) conspicuously avoids musical clichés on the subject, namely, not the silence and tranquillity associated with darkness – rather the disturbing content of the monologue, the text constantly exploits the already existing dynamics. In so doing, it creates an impression of the genre that despite its being common opera music – not only are the author’s musical and theatrical accompaniments excellent, but also his opera, which was revealed last summer in the one-act opera at the Music Academy, his opera final exam, entitled Spring Awakening."
— Operavilág (Gábor Bóka)

THE CORONATION OF POPPEA

Eiffel Art Studios, 2021

"Máté Bella’s work is the most recent evidence that he is a natural born theatrical composer"
— Operavilág (Kata Kondor)

LANIAKEA

Liszt Ferenc Academy of Music, 2015

"... bassoonist Bence Bogányi performed the concerto by the immensely talented Máté Bella specially written for this occasion. I won’t beat about the bush: this was the treat that made it worth it to come to the concert. We heard a composition that changed its theme and its tone of voice (we cannot really call it keys here) right at the moment the audience was starting to grow tired of it. The piece begins with a slow billow, but it is in fact a modular composition. As its title, Laniakea suggests, the music presents an interplanetary voyage. The author himself explains its meaning: the word originates from Hawaiian and means “boundless sky.” This expanse of space, the seemingly infinite distances, the white cloud of the stars is illustrated by the quivering sound of the violin bows, the bassoon solo over the tremolos, the chromatic sound complexes; as if they were not even musical events but states of matter. It wasn’t Ligeti I thought of first, but a movie experience. It recalled Christopher Nolan’s Interstellar in my mind, and its soundtrack by Hans Zimmer, who represented the same immeasurable vastness with a different toolkit. Bella’s music pulls the listener into a space where they cannot help but confront the terrifying scale of the universe around them and their own insignificance."
— Fidelio (László Kolozsi)

Hungarian Feast

Hungarian National Theatre, 2010

"Máté Bella’s music is splendid: he combines the quire’s speeches with the revised motifs of the forties’ chansonettes, folkloric art songs and solider songs, simultaneously converging and diverging music and historical periods."
— Színház (Róbert Markó)

Hungarian Feast

Hungarian National Theatre, 2010

"Máté Bella is a noteworthy composer: his music evokes the kitschy style of art songs and soldier songs, however it never lulls us into nostalgia but helps us to keep distance. Also his music may endorse the presence of the choir"
— Népszava (Péter Hamvay)