Transylvania, Scania, Jutland

I have just arrived in Kolding (remember Kolding in winter time? It is even more beautiful now) for a workshop tomorrow, after a short wedding detour to Helsingborg, which looks and feels way more exciting than seen from Hamlet’s side of the Øresund (or Öresund, if you fancy Swedish more than Danish).
  → Read more

Shawms and bagpipes

Superlative medieval tones, and a combined use of Romanian & Latin lyrics, in Mille Anni Passi Sunt. Plus, you cannot afford to miss my other personal favourites (including videoclips of live –ad litteram– shows): Dulcissima, O Varium Fortune, Venus Vina Musica, Totentanz, Chou Chou Sheng, Ballade de Mercy, Suam Elle Ires.
  → Read more

The hard road to Transylvania

4 hours inside a KLM/Malev plane that just wouldn’t take off at Schiphol (after 2 extra hours of waiting for the– eventually, wrong– plane to arrive); a (involuntary, for a change) night spent in beautiful but frozen Budapest (helped by the fact that my friend Balint was very inspired for the dinner suggestion; even the house white wine was very decent!–
  → Read more

Klausenburg, anno 1865

WHEN you leave Szamos Ujvár, the road passes straight over a plain, with little or nothing to relieve the monotony. A Hungarian village or two, a nobleman’s mansion with the surrounding farm-buildings,-that is all, until the tall spire and the various towers of Klausenburg rise before you.

  → Read more