Levente Gyöngyösi was commissioned by the Budapest Festival Orchestra to write his Symphony No. 3 for this year’s Mahler Festival. Like Mahler, Gyöngyösi is inspired to compose based on personal experiences and the source of his inspiration in this case was the birth of his daughter Hanga in December 2011. The central conceit of the four-movement work is the mystery of birth: the composition portrays the beginning of human life largely from the viewpoint of the embryo and the newborn baby. Mah...ler’s Symphony No. 5 was written as a declaration of love: it is addressed to Alma Schindler, whom Mahler met in November 1901, became engaged to one month later, and married after four months. A contemporary of the composer – and the foremost interpreter of his works – noted down a story related by both parties on the score received from Mahler: that Mahler had sent the manuscript of the Adagietto to Alma, who, understanding the message concealed within the notes, had answered simply: “Come!” There is little surviving comment by the composer regarding this symphony, which was composed in 1901 and 1902. What observations remain relate only to the first movement to be completed, the Scherzo. The composer compared this to “man in the full light of day, at the zenith of life,” elsewhere to a “comet’s tail” or to “chaos,” which “eternally gives birth to a new world, which perishes again in the next moment”. Mahler’s comparisons also spoke of a “foaming, roaring, raging sea” and of “primeval sounds”.
Parking information
We wish to inform you that in the event that Müpa Budapest's underground garage and outdoor car park are operating at full capacity, it is advisable to plan for increased waiting times when you arrive. In order to avoid this, we recommend that you depart for our events in time, so that you you can find the ideal parking spot quickly and smoothly and arrive for our performance in comfort. The Müpa Budapest underground garage gates will be operated by an automatic number plate recognition system. Parking is free of charge for visitors with tickets to any of our paid performances on that given day. The detailed parking policy of Müpa Budapest is available here.
Safe ticket purchase
Dear Visitors, please note that only tickets purchased from the Müpa website and official ticket offices are guaranteed to be valid. To avoid possible inconvenience, we suggest buying tickets to our performances and concerts via the mupa.hu website, the Interticket national network (jegy.hu) or at our official ticket offices.