Bartók Béla, ifj.: Chronicles of Béla Bartók's Life (Budapest, 2021)
War Years (1914–1919)
1916 CHRONICLES OF BÉLA BARTOK'S LIFE 31 October and 1 November - Two Pictures Op. 10. is presented in Zurich with Volkmar Andreae conducting. Színházi Élet (Theatre Life) gives notice in their issue of 29 October-5 November 1916: “Very few know about a new ballet that looks like becoming the musical sensation of this season. Its entitled The Wooden Prince, and its music is written by Béla Bartok whose first stage composition our musician circles are looking forward to with the utmost interest. Bartok had just finished the orchestration of the ballet, and he already played his new opus at the Opera House for Commissioner Count Miklos Bánffy and Director Aurél Kern, who listened with exceeding enthusiasm. Count Bánffy set about the design of the stage scenery at once with feverish haste”. 7 November - Bartok hands in the piano arrangement and the already finished parts of the orchestral score of The Wooden Prince to the Budapest Opera. 8 November - Mrs Bartok writes Mrs Emil Tóth in Doboz: “Béla handed in one-third of the ballet at the Opera -, he is getting started with the orchestration of the other two-thirds now. One piece for mixed choir of his will be performed in December (he made polyphonic arrangements of Tót folk songs)”. (On 5 January the Hungarian Womens Choir Society performed Four Slovakian Folk Songs for mixed choir, with piano accompaniment.) 18 November - Bartok catches a bad cold that lasts even on the 23rd, so he cant go to Budapest during this time. 4 December - He writes Anna Pataky that he is expecting her for a piano lesson at the Music Academy on 5 December. During December his wife is getting sickly. On 14 December she goes to her parents’ in Budapest to be examined, and it is discovered that she has got a pulmonary infection. Károly Ziegler Snr and his wife (Mrs Bartoks parents) live already at 4 Szilágyi Dezső Square; this will be the Bartoks’ flat between 1922 164
