http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=H0Xh-ZZFPZIThe Hungarian March was written during a concert tour Hector Berlioz (bilden) undertook in central Europe during 1846, and specifically for performance in Budapest. A friend in Vienna had advised him that success in Hungary would be certain if he were to compose a work based on one of their national tunes. Berlioz heeded the advice, and chose the Rakoczy March - which he describes in the score as 'a Hungarian war song, very ancient, and by an unknown author.' He wrote the March in the space of one night, before leaving Vienna for Budapest. It was a stunning success in Budapest, and was encored every time Berlioz played it in Hungary. Writing his opera "The Damnation of Faust" a little later, Berlioz could not resist using such a successful tune again. The opera is based on Goethe's version of the Faust legend, and has nothing to do with Hungary at all. But at the beginning of the opera, Berlioz quite brazenly places Faust "on a Hungarian plain", just so that he has an excuse for including this March! /Källa The Nottinghamn Philharmonic Orchestras hemsida.
