Hungarian Folk Musician to Receive PH Foundation Peace Prize 

Hungarian folk musician, ethnologist and composer József Terék (center) paid a courtesy visit to Ambassador Frank R. Cimafranca (left) at the Embassy of the Philippines Chancery in Budapest on Friday, 19 January 2024. Also in the photo is Minister and Consul General Roderico C. Atienza, who supervises the Embassy’s cultural promotion program

BUDAPEST 26 January 2024 – A state-awarded Hungarian folk musician will be recognized next month for his efforts to promote international peace and understanding through music by a Philippine non-profit foundation in Manila, the Embassy of the Philippines in Budapest said in a report to the Department.

József Terék, 43, told Philippine Ambassador Frank R. Cimafranca in a courtesy call at the chancery of the Philippine Embassy in Budapest on Friday, 17 January 2024, that he will become the second Hungarian national to be given such an honor by the Manila-based Sino-Phil Asia International Peace Awards Foundation, a non-profit organization established in 2015.

The first Hungarian recipient was Dr József Bencze, Hungarian Ambassador to the Philippines in 2017-2020, for his translation into Hungarian language of Dr José Rizal’s patriotic poem, “Mi Ultimo Adios” in 2020. A marker of the poem was unveiled at Fort Santiago, Intramuros in 2017.

As Ambassador Bencze was not able to receive the prize due to a COVID-19 lockdown, he will join Terék and 17 other laureates at ceremonies to be held at the Fiesta Pavilion Grand Ballroom of the Manila Hotel on 16 February 2024.

Terék, who was awarded in 2014 the Hungarian Gold Cross of Merit, the highest class of the fifth highest state decoration of Hungary, for "the arrangement and promotion of folk songs and folk music of the Tápió region, as well as for his music education and performing activities," offered his services to the Embassy at its bilateral events this year.

During his visit to the Philippines next month, his third, he also intends to give a free recital of tarogato, a traditional Hungarian woodwind instrument, to Filipino music students and the public as his contribution to the commemoration of the golden anniversary this year of diplomatic relations between the Philippines and Hungary.

The two countries which established diplomatic relations on 28 September 1973 held commemorative events in both Manila and Budapest to promote and deepen ties.

In 2018, Terék visited the Philippines for the first time with his folk music band for a concert tour at the University of the Philippines (UP), University of Santo Tomas, International School of Manila, De la Salle-College of Saint Benilde. In 2020, he returned alone for concerts at UP, University of San Carlos in Cebu, Ateneo de Davao University in Davao.

Terék, who is also an ethnographer, composer and Cultural Officer of Pest County Municipality, is also keen to follow the footsteps of Jenő Takács, a Hungarian composer and pianist who was a contemporary of Béla Bartók, and who learned from French composer Darius Milhaud, Hungarian music pedagogue Zoltán Kodály, and American violinist Yehudi Menuhin.

Takács worked as a professor of piano and composition at the UP Conservatory of Music in 1932-34. During this time, he went around the country making recordings of Philippine folk music. The audio recordings Takács made on the Philippines were enlisted in UNESCO's “Memory of the World” collection in 1999. Takács also gave concerts in Japan, China and Hong Kong.

A graduate of Nyíregyháza College of Music in eastern Hungary, Terék is an active promoter of Hungarian music. 

In 2017, at the request of the local government of Pest County, Terék arranged more than a hundred folk songs collected by Zoltán Kodály from a total of nine settlements in the county – Dömsöd, Gomba, Gyón, Őrszentmiklós, Páty, Szigetszentmiklós, Tinnye, Tök and Váchartyán – and published a CD of them on the 50th anniversary of Kodály's death that year. END

Hungarian folk musician, ethnologist and composer József Terék (center) shows Ambassador Frank R. Cimafranca (left) photos of his performances in the Philippines in 2018 and 2020 while on a courtesy visit at the Embassy of the Philippines Chancery in Budapest on Friday, 19 January 2024. Also in the photo is Minister and Consul General Roderico C. Atienza, who supervises the Embassy’s cultural promotion program. Terék is going to the Philippines for the third time next month to receive a prize for his contributions to performing arts by the Manila-based Sino-Phil Asia International Peace Awards Foundation, a non-profit organization established in 2015

For more information, visit https://www.budapestpe.dfa.gov.ph or https://www.facebook.com/PHLinHungary/.