János Gonda

János Gonda (born January 11, 1932) is a Hungarian jazz pianist. He was born in Budapest. He studied at the Franz Liszt Academy of Music, and earned his diploma first at the musicological and then in the piano department. He belonged to the front-line of Hungarian jazz musicians. His varied activities include composition, concert performances, teaching and musicological research.

Music

He formed his first band in 1962, and with them made the first LP in the Hungarian "Modern Jazz" series. Since then he has led several bands which can be heard on the anthology-form records in that same series. In the late 1960s he co-led the Gonda-Krusa Quartet with the Polish vibrophnis Richard Kruza. He also recorded with his Gonda Sextet, which he formed in 1972. One of their famous recordings is titled Shaman Song. The sextet consisted of János Gonda (piano, electrical piano), Gábor Balazs (bass), Tamas Berki (vocal, guitar, percussion), Péter Kántor (soprano and alto saxophone), Istvan Dely (conga, percussion) and Gyula Kovacs (drums, percussion).