The Amadinda Percussion Group is a musical group that was created in Budapest in 1984 by four musicians who had recently finished studying at the Ferenc Liszt Academy of Music.
Since its founding, the group has had two main goals: to share percussion music that Hungarian people had not heard before, and to perform the works of Hungarian composers both in Hungary and around the world. A key goal is to encourage Hungarian and international composers to write new music for percussion. In recent years, the group has also studied traditional percussion music from different cultures, performed original music written by its members, and recorded important pieces for percussion instruments.
From the start, Amadinda has worked with famous musicians such as John Cage (by recording all of his percussion music), Steve Reich, Bruno Canino, Peter Eötvös, Rosemary Hardy, András Keller, Zoltán Kocsis, György Kurtág, György Ligeti, András Schiff, Zoltán Jeney, and Istvan Marta.
Awards
- 1984 Stipendium Prize, Darmstadt
- 1985 Gaudeamus International Interpreters Award, Amsterdam, First Prize
- 1986 Prize from the Hungarian Composers’ Association for excellent performance of Hungarian music
- 1987 Recording of the Year by Hungaroton
- 1988 Ferenc Liszt Prize awarded by the Hungarian Government
- 1991, 1998 Prize from the Society ARTISJUS Hungarian Bureau for the Protection of Authors’ Rights
- 1997 Order of Merit of the Hungarian Republic
- 2002 Chevalier de l’ordre des Arts et des Lettres (Z. Rácz)
- 2004 Kossuth Prize awarded by the Hungarian Government
- 2006 Pro Urbe Budapest Prize