The world-renowned ballerina Ida Rubinstein approached Ravel in 1928 to orchestrate Albéniz’s piano cycle Iberia for her. Due to copyright concerns, Ravel suggested that he write his own Spanish-themed piece instead. The composer himself gave a concise description of the work as a “modern dance movement, uniform throughout in its melody, harmony and rhythm, the latter being tapped out continuously on the drum. The only element of variety is supplied by the orchestral crescendo.” Boléro was premi...èred in November of the same year, and subsequently conducted by Toscanini in 1929. Ravel wrote two piano concertos, the first in the key of G major in 1931. The composer characterized the work as “a concerto in the strict sense, written in the spirit of Mozart and Saint-Saëns. I believe that a concerto can be both gay and brilliant without necessarily being profound or aiming at dramatic effects. (…) In some ways my concerto is not unlike my violin sonata; it uses certain effects borrowed from jazz, but only in moderation!” The first movement, written in classic sonata form, is followed by a poetic slow movement which is perhaps the most popular part of the concerto. The jazz elements appear mostly in the sparkling closing movement. Stravinsky’s reputation was unequivocally based on three ballets – The Firebird, Petrushka and The Rite of Spring – which he composed for the Ballets Russes in Paris headed by Sergei Diaghilev. He composed the music for the tragic story of the straw puppet Petrushka, a figure familiar from Russian folk tales, in 1910-1911. Adapted for the stage by Alexandre Benois and Stravinsky, it premièred in Paris on 13 June 1911 under conductor Pierre Monteux, with choreography by Mikhail Fokine. The title role was danced by Vaslav Nijinsky. The uninterrupted success of the work is demonstrated by the revision Stravinsky carried out in 1946 and 1947. This version was intended primarily for concert performance, employing fewer instruments and introducing a number of changes in tempo and other small adjustments.
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.