The American Exile of Bela Bartok
'It's as though we've been caught in a storm at sea and blown to shore with no more than the clothes on our backs.' So wrote the great Hungarian composer, Bartok, on his arrival in New York in 1940, after his flight from war-torn Europe. He was to spend the last years of his life there fighting sickness, poverty and failure. Nevertheless, consoled by the cycles of nature, his last five years produced some of his greatest and most moving music.
In this second film in BBC2's celebratory season, many of the composer's friends and colleagues, including Sir
Georg Solti and Sir Yehudi Menuhin join his sons Peter and Bela Jr to tell the story of these last years of exile.
Music performed by Budapest Symphony Orchestra conducted by Ervin Lukacs and Sir Georg Solti , with Gyorgy Sandor (piano) and Laszlo Barsony (viola). Photography
KEITH HOPPER. JANOS ILLES Sound LASZLO MATZ
Film editor MALCOLM DANIEL Director DONALD STURROCK