In 1914, he completed his Duo for violin and cello Op7 and, in 1915 his amazing Sonata for solo cello Op 8, the most challenging and stunning work for cello, The Six Songs known as Lost Melodies, appeared in 1906 as Op 6.īetween 19 he was active as a music critic. He married Emma on 3 August and collected folk songs from Transylvania. On 29 May there were performance in Zurich of his Quartet no 1 Op 2, Piano Pieces Op 3 and the Sonata for cello and piano Op 4. On 17 March 1910, he enjoyed a composers evening. In 1908, he made visits to Switzerland and Italy. He had successfully gained his PhD in languages and linguistics. He studied with Charles Widor in Paris and, for a while, was interested in Debussy. In the autumn of 1907, Kodály became professor of composition at the Music Academy in Budapest. In 19, he continued his studies in Berlin and Paris. In October there was the premiere of his Summer Evenings for orchestra and the Hungarian Folk Songs, the first ten were by Bartók and the second set by Kodály. In 1906, he submitted his dissertation, The Strophic Structure of Hungarian Folk Songs.

This was also the first year of his collecting Hungarian folk songs. He entered the Liszt Music Academy in 1900 studying composition with Hans Koessler and had other academic studies at the Etvos College and at the Peter Pazmany University dealing with languages and linguistics. In 1904 he made visits to Bayreuth, Munich and Salzburg and, the following year, met Bartók and Emma Schlesinger who was to become his wife. From the age of ten to eighteen he composed much music. His father was an amateur musician and Zoltán learned the violin as a child and sang in the cathedral choir. He spent a lot of time in his childhood in Galanta and Nagyszombat.

Zoltán Kodály was born on 16 December 1882 in Kecskemet, Hungary.

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