English Version
My Hobbies
MUSIC is No.1
but you probably guessed that from the separate section.
I also play music. My main instrument is the steel string acoustic guitar. I also play electric guitar, 12 string, bass and basically any other guitar you can think of. I also play a little mandolin, dobro and piano. My goal is to learn the pedal steel.
My music. Well it is weird. The music I write is far from what I listen to. I write both on the piano and the guitar. I only have a few songs I like but they almost all lack lyrics. I only wrote a few lyrics that I actually liked. And some of those got lost during the years. I will have the others up sometime. I also wrote a few lyric translations. My favorite one is a translation of a song from my dad's band. I'll put that up too as soon as I get it typed.
Back to music. Most of my songs are fingerpicked acoustic songs. Many use the classic lyre tuning where the G string to F#. It opens new frontiers in the key of D and gives a medieval feel to the music. It is a commonly used trick in classical guitar. I learned it from a classical player and have been playing around with it a lot. I unfortunately do not play classical guitar but who know, one of these days I might learn that. Now I have enough trouble playing slide guitar.
Here are pics of my two acoustics. I do not have pics of my electric yet. (but it is not even done, it is mussing a few parts) It is a 1983 first year production Squier by Fender (Made in Japan) Telecaster with Blond Ash Body and Maple one piece neck. It is still missing a pickguard but it'll have a bakelite black lacquered one. (like the original 50's tele) The telecaster is the first and best electric ever made. That is my firm position.
Poetry
Poetry is something that has been close to me all my life. My teachers tried extremely hard to kill every sensitivity towards poetry in me but they were unsuccessful. I was never a good reader. Doctors say I probably had some sort of reading disability but it is too late to do anything about it now. Fortunately it went away with time but it sure made me hate my literature classes in elementary, middle, and high school. I never really wrote poetry. In 6th grade I wrote a few little poems in Hungarian for a girl (she never got them) I am sure I still have them. Other than that I only wrote lyrics to songs but with extremely little success. I actually wrote a poem in English this year. I was reading a lot of poetry at the time and I had to battle a tough issue with someone from the opposite gender. She got these words out of me. I am not sure I like what I wrote but go ahead decide for your self. The poem is called: Remember I know one thing. I will not become a writer. I better stick to music.
My main interest is 20th century Hungarian poetry. The first generation of the "Nyugat" (the West which was a Literature Magazine in Hungary) Mihály Babits (1883-1941), Árpád Toth (1886-1928), Gyula Juhász (1883-1937), Dezsô Kosztolányi (1885-1936) etc. My favorite is Attila József (1905-1937) who is actually not one of the Nyugat's first generation but he is still my favorite.
This place has a lot of poems. My main resource. But they are in Hungarian.
Translations:
I have found it extremely interesting to read English translations of Hungarian poetry. Fortunately Attila József has a lot of translations. I was fortunate to find 5 translations of my favorite poem: Ode. This is my favorite one but you can find the others at my Attila József translation page. It was interesting to read 4 different versions and compare this extremely emotional sophisticated poem. Some of his poems I found up to 6 translation. Maybe with time I will post them all. (that is my goal) I do not have enough time to read different translations. So far I only got into comparing Attila József's work though I read several other translations of 20th Century Hungarian poetry
Go to my Attila József translation page.
Computers
I do NOT like computers but they can be called a hobby. I work with them a lot. I actually like hardware jobs. I also like old computers. (old meaning, not plug and play, Dos based, PCI less) One of my goals is to put together a monster 486. The best one I can think up. Maybe learn Linux or just use Windows 3.1. I am positive it can used for anything I could possibly need.