Hungarian Peasant Dances, Op. 100/2

• “Hungarian Peasant Dances” is the second movement of Hungarian Peasant Songs for Orchestra (1933), arranged by Bartók from his Fifteen Hungarian Peasant Songs for piano (composed 1914-1918).¹
• Bartók intended this arrangement to be relatively easy for orchestra musicians, thus making his music (and Hungarian folk music in general) more accessible.²

These pieces were “assembled for money, as such a thing—because the music is appealing, not very difficult to play, and made by a ‘known’ author—in all certainty will be played often, on the radio etc.”

Bartók to his mother (1931), explaining why he was busy making accessible orchestral arrangements of his piano pieces.³

1. “Béla Bartók: Hungarian Peasant Songs for orchestra | UE14496,” Universal Edition, accessed July 18, 2019, https://www.universaledition.com/sheet-music-shop/hungarian-peasant-songs-for-orchestra-bartok-bela-ue14496.
2. Ibid.
3. László Somfai, liner notes to Bartók: Concerto for Orchestra, Four Orchestral Songs, Hungarian Peasant Songs, Leon Botstein, London Philharmonic Orchestra, Telarc 80564, CD, 2001.