Palya Bea

Born Nov. 11, 1976 in Hungary, Beáta Palya's journey towards becoming the artist she is today began when she was just a child. From an early beginning with a folk group from her village, Beáta went on to win regional singing competitions before joining Zurgo, a traditional folk group, at the age of 16. Inspired by these experiences, she went on to study the ancient song cultures of Hungary and Transylvania at University: her thesis explored the relationship between traditional and modern music.
Despite her interest in the theoretical and historical side to music, performing remained her first love. To the Hungarian folk of her youth, she has crafted Jazz, Gypsy, Indian and Persian influences into her ever-developing style. In addition, four-years spent working with a musical theatre - Szőke "Bladder Circus" Szabolcs - allowed her to explore a range of vocal traditions from around the world, which have all added to the development of her unique voice.
Prior to launching her solo career, Beáta performed with a number of groups. Between 1997 and 2003, she joined the folk group Karpatia as their principal singer and dancer and co-founded the world-music group Folkestra with Andras Monori and five other musicians. She also performed with Sebő, a traditional troubadour group acclaimed for their representations of Hungarian ballads and toured Japan with the celebrated classical organist Laszlo Fassang: their innovative fusion of improvised organ music and folk songs was greeted so enthusiastically that the tour was repeated a second time. In the winter of 2002, Beáta received a four-month fellowship to study Indian music with Kakoli Sengupta and Patrick Moutal, she participated in the Belgian musical project Caravane as a singer for the Balkan folk group Daraduna and she was awarded the Artisjus prize for music in Hungary.
Beáta officially launched her career as a soloist in January 2003 and her first solo album, Ágrol-ágra – Tradition in Motion - was released on Orpheia that September. Since going solo she has performed across the world, including in Paris, Amsterdam, Budapest, London, Sao Paulo and Moscow. Highlights so far have included opening the 2004 Cultural Olympiad in Athens in, where she represented Hungary during the international concert ‘The World and Manos Hadjidakis’: 12 musicians from around the world (including Teresa Salgueiro from Madredeus), presented the works of the great Greek composer Manos Hadjidakis, in their own language.
In March 2005, Beáta formed her own Quintet and merged the classical, folk and jazz influences of accomplished Gypsy musicians Lukács Miklós and Novák Csaba, on the acoustic bass and cimbalom resepctively, with the talents of Hungarian mulit-wind instrumentalist Szokolay Dongó Balázs and percussionist Dés András. In 2006, Beáta saw her 2nd solo album, Álom-álom, kitalálom (2004) – a musical fairytale for adults and children alike - translated into a Hungarian theatre production, she recorded seven songs for the soundtrack of – and played a role in - the new Tony Gatlif film Transylvania, and she signed with the French record label Naive (http://www.naive.fr). She also released her 3rd solo album, Psyché, to great acclaim.
Following the release of Psyché, Beáta has been chosen to receive the 2006 Aphelandra Award – a Hungarian award for humanist and / or cultural achievements. Psyché couples the voice and music of Beáta and her Quintet with the poetry of the celebrated Hungarian poet Weöres Sandor. Filled with folk, Gypsy and jazz influences, it is a work which takes you on an 80 minute long journey to a very particular Hungary.
So far, the multi-lingual Beáta has only recorded albums in Hungarian – albeit with a smattering of German or French on occasion. However, she has stated a desire to sing in French and English on her next disc.
Her voice: roots and influences
You could try and classify Beáta's voice as a mezzo-soprano, but to do so would not be to do her justice. Beáta is continually studying the art of song. The strength of her talent is such that she is able to use what she learns to develop her own style. By continually crafting elements of diverse vocal traditions into her performances and recordings, Beáta has developed a voice so accomplished and unique that it is not easily defined.
At the very least her rich and varied voice distinguishes her from singers who do not diverge from the traditional (Hungarian) folk styles. Hers is a voice that can be broadly described as being built upon the following elements:
Improvisation & experimentation:
During a four-year period working in musical theatre Beáta was able to explore and experiment with various vocal influences. From the repetitive choruses of Central Africa, she learnt how to perfectly imitate the sound of piercing flutes. The women of Bulgaria taught her to deepen her voice in order to produce exactly the same sound as the bagpipes that accompany them. Arabic women who – with their faces turned toward the sky - sung of love from deep down in their souls, their voices trembling and gasping with passion, touched Beáta's soul as she practiced their ways. She experimented with the rhythmic scatting of the Gypsies and the soft ‘bl-bl-bl-‘ (produced by a light movement of the tongue) which accompanies Hungarian lullabies; she explored baroque songs where rapid vibratos are held on a single note and she drew inspiration from the vocal play and improvisation of Bobby McFerrin.
Traditional Hungarian folk music:
As a child, Beáta learned to sing the folk music of her own culture by instinctively imitating what she heard around her. Music performed an important community and a psychological role in the Hungarian villages of old: to sing was to express what was in one's heart. Singers often improvised according to their state of mind and desires.
Later, Beáta polished what she had learnt as a child by listening to cassette recordings of peasant elders who sang from the depths of their hearts. Their voices were natural, they sang as they spoke: their intonation perfectly mirrored their feelings.
In these songs, Beáta found something she could identify with. From there she developed her ornamentation - a relaxed tone and a voice of velvet.
Gypsy music:
Beáta’s maternal grandfather was a gypsy bass player and the influence of Gypsy music has become an intrinsic part of her repertoire.
The Gypsy tone of the voice is often piercing, powerful and raucous. Their ‘scat’ singing is a technique where, without words, they create a very distinct rhythm, their voices becoming instruments.
More extreme than Hungarian music, the expressive, liberated music of the Gypsies spoke to Beáta’s soul, and she found that the humor and playfulness, which is an intrinsic part of music for the Gypsies, allowed her to express a fundamental part of her character as a musician.
Sung poetry:
Beáta both writes poetry to be used in songs and experiments with singing poetry. She often mixes the verse of classical and modern poets with traditional folk melodies, and she worked with Sebo, one of the most respected Hungarian groups in this genre, for five years. Her recent disc, Psyché, marks her greatest accomplishment to date with this format. Her recent experiences with this format have inspired her to write more of her own poetry.
Music of the East: India and Persia:
Beáta studied both Indian and Persian music.
The relationship between melody and rhythm in Indian music is extremely refined: it is improvised yet it adheres to strict rules. The tonal range is rounded and endless and melodies are ornamented: they can incorporate tiny grace notes as subtle as a sigh as well as forced or exaggerated notes. The relationship between the sounds is often thought to reflect the hidden depths of human relationships - desire, fear, indecision, and mischief. By studying this music, Beáta found herself moving closer to the essence of song.
Persian music differs from European music due to the quarter notes in its scales and the fact that is characterized by the idea of ‘taking time in music’: one has time, the music flows slowly and calmly. Singers often hold notes for a long time, ‘pressing’ a final note while embellishing it at will, whispering and amplifying the voice as finely and slowly as possible. One of the most interesting technical differences is the use of the ‘gasp’ style, reminiscent of birdsong.
The essence of singing:
When Beáta began to study Persian singing, she went to see an Iranian friend in Budapest. They sang Persian songs together for hours. When he heard her sounding tense, due to concentration or from having to repeat something many times over, he calmly and tenderly told her: "Beáta, sing in your own voice."
Beáta has never forgotten these words of advice. The essence of singing, she believes, is to remain sincere - to find the notes from within one's own heart. It is to know why one sings and to sing with one's own voice.
Recorded and Live performances:
Beáta’s voice and music has the power to touch souls whether through her albums or her live performances. But, there is a difference: a true performer, Beáta brings more to her stage appearances than simply a live rendition of one of her albums. All her live performances are unique.
A talented improviser, Beáta always works with musicians who are able to improvise with her, which means that her live performances have a magical, spontaneous energy. Beáta considers her concerts to be a sacred time where she and her musicians listen to the audience as well as to one another: it is this belief that allows them to enter into an intimate and soulful dialogue with the audience, whose energy is always the flame that ignites the fire of improvisation. This fire brings about any number of musical surprises, both for the audience and for the performers.
In Hungarian, the roots of the word ‘Lélek’ (Soul) and ‘Lélegzet’ (Breath) are the same. With her Quintet, Beáta has brought together five people who – musically speaking - breathe together as one. When they perform together they have the ability to move between moods with the music and the audiences’ reaction as their guides, their souls combining so that every pulsation becomes a musical note.
Text by Lucy Crystal