This year's Wolf Prize for Music, and its $100,000 prize, has been awarded to 98-year-Hungarian avant-garde composer György Kurtág. The Wolf Foundation described Kurtag as "a shining example of a true musician and a human being," and says his music "deals with the existential questions of the human soul, focuses on fundamental emotions such as love and sorrow, fear, anxiety, despair, and a desire for harmony and reconciliation."
Born in 1926 in Romania, Kurtag began studying the piano at age 5, and entered the Franz Liszt Academy of Music in 1946. There, he counted Sándor Veress and Ferenc Farkas among his teachers. For several years, he was a répétiteur for soloists at the National Concert Bureau, and then was invited to teach at his alma mater. Although he officially retired in 1986, Kurtag regularly taught classes until 1993, and continues to give chamber music courses in Europe and the United States.
He frequently collaborated with his wife, the late pianist Marta Kurtag, who performed Kurtag's works and his transcriptions of Bach.
As a conductor, Kurtag was known to "challenge conventional boundaries and expand the possibilities of musical expression." The Wolf Foundation describes his music as "[connected] to Hungarian folk traditions and [committed] to modernist innovation." Perhaps most notable in his diverse oeuvre is Játékok (Games), where Kurtag explores musical language and experiments with form.
He has previously earned the Grawemeyer Award for Music Composition, and served as composer-in-residence with the Berlin Philharmonic, the Wiener Konzerthaus, and the Dutch National Opera, among others.
Other recipients of the Wolf Prize for Music are Paul McCartney, soprano Jessye Norman, conductor Riccardo Muti, and composer Olivier Messiaen.
This year's Wolf Prize for science is shared by Jose-Alain Sahel and Botond Roska, who have worked to restore lost sight by making surviving neurons light-sensitive to replace lost photoreceptors.
Established in 1978, the prize recognizes "achievements in the interest of mankind and friendly relations among people."
