„It’s been exactly twenty years since I last worked with Károly Makk in making the film „Another Way”. It seemed then to require great courage to ask a young musician who has just finished his first music for the movie „Without a Trace” to compose this one. But he knew what he wanted and the collective work went extraordinarily. So I was happy to learn that after twenty years he wanted to work with me again.
The film is the drama of two aged man, burdened with sins and treacheries of the past as well as with the confused early-capitalist relations crawling out from the socialism, something that describes Hungary today.
The roles are played by highly qualified actors: Darvas, Törõcsik, Garas, Nagy-Kálózy…, and the story is built from many subtly formed acts. This is what music has to follow, support and counterpoint. Only while working on it did I realise how huge this material was. Only through composition did I understand why the gorgeous editor of the film, Mari Rigó used to say: „László, this is a film that needs music!”
I used two methods of composing and recording the music for the film. I worked a part of it out very precisely at home, but for certain acts I only wrote the themes and figures with a loose structure, and in the studio we played it while seeing the pictures with the other musicians.
It is a hard task that takes lots of concentration, for the musicians have to pay attention to the pictures on the monitor, and not just each other. This I can only imagine performed by highly trained jazz musicians.
There are lots of kinds of music in the film, but due to the nature of movie on most parts it appears only in short segments. These themes were recorded as individual compositions as soon as we finished the film. We were working in a good and quite elevated mood, and I believe this can be felt through the compositions.”
„This is how Segments was born.”
Grateful acknowledgements are due for this to Károly Makk, Mari Rigó, András Bõhm and the musicians working as co-composers on the album.
László Dés
Soprano Saxophone: László Dés
Trumpet: Kornél Kovács-Fekete
Cimbalon: Ildikó Vékony
Balázs Elemér Group
Drums: Elemér Balázs
Percussion: András Dés
Contrabass: Mátyás Szandai
Guitar: Gábor Juhász
Piano: József Balázs
Pannon Chamber Orchestra
Leader of the Orchestra: Balázs Bujtor
Conductor: Péter Erdélyi