From Budapest, Hungary comes the astounding Modern Art Orchestra under the artistic direction of Kornél Fekete-Kovács. Many of our Jazz Monsters fans know of Kornél from previous appearances. But this will be the first time that his Modern Art Orchestra has travelled to the U.S.

Lively, snappy, intuitive and captivating. Since its formation in 2005, Modern Art Orchestra has been a melting pot for the artistry of highly qualified young musicians in Hungary’s jazz, classical music and crossover scene. Founder and director of the band, Hungary’s leading trumpeter Kornél Fekete-Kovács established the first group of musicians with the dream of operating a contemporary big band which would focus on playing compositions by some of the best contemporary creative musicians of the country. Through its first years of activity, Modern Art Orchestra received masterpieces from composers like Péter Eötvös.

Since the first chapter of its story, MAO has gained the status of an internationally renowned chamber orchestra that is engaged in many genres of music including jazz, pop, classical or contemporary ensemble. It has had countless successful projects together with the world’s leading musicians from Bob Mintzer, Dave Liebman, Kurt Elling or Wallace Roney through Rhoda Scott, Julian Joseph, Mike Garson or Silje Neergard to Mezzoforte, New York Voices and Harlem Gospel Choir – just to name a few.

Modern Art Orchestra's repertory contains more than 15 hours of music uniquely composed for, dedicated to and premiered by the band. During its American tour, Modern Art Orchestra is going to play a choice of compositions which reflect their musical origin of contemporary improvised music in Europe: big band orchestrations of the music by George Frideric Händel, Béla Bartók, Gioacchino Rossini and Franz Schubert are to be played as well as the best of European jazz repertoire including some of the band members' crispy, drifting and captivating compositions.