Péter Erdős

From the Hungarian Wikipedia page

Peter Erdos ( Budapest, 1925 . July 7 - Budapest, 1990 . February 21 ), lawyer, manager, indeed the entire Hungarian pop music world leader in the Kádár regime under. He was also called Popcaster.

He was born in Budapest as a bank officer of Mihály Erdős Imre and Grünhut Olga. [2] His parents divorced at the age of two (1928), followed by his mother, a modest seamstress. After graduating from the grammar school, he had been outraged since 1943. In 1944, because of his Jewish origin, he was summoned to labor service. In Bor, he worked on railway construction, where he met Miklós Radnóti. He was later deported to Sachsenhausen and then to Buchenwald. By the time the Americans liberated the camp in 1945, it dropped to 39 kilos.

After the Second World War, he spent one year in a Swiss sanatorium where he became acquainted with Hungarian communist emigration. From 1949 he edited the Hungarian Day and worked at the Athenaeum Publisher. He was educated at the College of Drama, where Miklós Szinetár and Irs Psota were his students. He worked as a journalist at the Freedom and Free People magazines. In 1950, he was arrested, accused of espionage , and then spent three years in Kistarcsa in private. 1953he was freed and then joined the party. A year later, he was banned from the Hungarian Radio , where he worked as an outsider. In 1954 he attended the rehabilitation trial of János Kádár as a witness. In February 1956, with an accusation of anxiety in Rákosi , he was sentenced to one and a half years in jail at first instance, but suspended in second instance for his sentence.

He became an external colleague at the Hungarian Nation and worked as a radio broadcaster. He initiated the Petőfi Circle's Applied Art Discussion. On October 22, 1956 , during a meeting held at the university , he spoke as he spoke in his autobiographical interview: he also produced a report on the student assembly, which was broadcast at Kossuth Radio that evening. He later recalled this: "I spoke enthusiastically about the courage of the students' opposition, and emphasized their attraction to Imre Nagy . " [3]

Péter Erdős was in the radio building the next day, on October 23. Talking to Péter Földes, they found that the ban on student demonstration was considered disastrous. (At 12.53 he interrupted the broadcast of Kossuth Radio, saying that the Minister of Interior had banned the organized demonstration.) [4] According to his memory, Péter Erdős stated that this can only be reversed if Miklós Vásárhelyi agrees.

“Péter Földes went out and came back in ten minutes, managed to talk to Vásárhely, approving the demonstration. In his opinion, it should be said on the radio that the Minister of Interior has allowed the demonstration. Since Hartay, Vice President of the Radio, trusted me more than I was in Earth, he persuaded Earthman to dictate the news about the permission of the Interior Minister demonstration. He was grounded, Hartay signed, and in five minutes he was told on the radio that the Interior Minister had allowed the demonstration. It is not true that they have allowed this to be manipulated. ” - said in a much later interview. According to Erdős, Valéria Benke, the president of the radio at that time, asked for an explanation, but the investigation was not carried out due to the events.

Péter Erdős, in his curriculum vitae, stood on the side of the revolution in 1956. In the next few days he worked in the parliament beside Vásárhelyi. Josip Broz Tito and Yugoslav self-government could use the Yugoslav ambassador's car.

After November 4, he took his wife, daughter and family to Vásárhelyi. He and Vásárhelyi used the right of asylum at the roman home of the Yugoslav military attache. [4] He stayed there until 18 November. 1957 . She gave up on March 26th. One year was sentenced to six months' imprisonment on the basis of a judgment of the Supreme Court, 1958. was released on August 19th. Between 1958 and 1959 he led the Theater Department of the Copyright Office, and from 1960 to 1966 studied at the ELTE Faculty of Law at the evening.

From 1968 he was the Legal Counsel and Head of the Press Division at the Hungarian Record Record Company, and was the director of the PRO Manager Office. As a Hungaroton employee, he was the most well-known manager of light music. From 1977 he managed the Neoton Familia (primarily in the name of Éva Csepregi ) [7] with the aim of making Hungary a world pop pop. The band was successful in East Asia in particular. In 1990, his recollections of "How to make a pop manager" appeared.

The implementation of the Kádár culture policy guidelines was an integral and not compulsive part of its activity, which was primarily censorship. Such decisions are usually inextricably linked to personal and professional conflicts and dislikes in the course of their activities; the latter were generally not concealed by themselves or by the musicians concerned. Many musicians have made their career difficult or unattractive, such as. Zsuzsa Cserháti, Béla Radics , Hobo Blues Band and Beatrice. Frontman of the KFT, András LaárIn his words, "It was not enough for him to be successful abroad as well as the band Neoton Familia." He told us that could have done a hundred thousand album sales with us, but did not want to, so that was only 30 thousand. " [8] [9] Not only a number of musician interviews, autobiography, memoirs prove the existence of the role carried by the Forest semi-official, semi-self-appointed, overbearing boss (which, according to recollections, was manifested, among others, in the sexual exploitation of singers and female musicians), the affected artists recorded the phenomenon in songs. The CPgThe band wrote a song titled "Péter Erdős" in the years of death of the Kádár system, one of the last double albums of Beatrice ( Beatrice '77 -'88 ). Birthday c. in parallels with Horger Antall.

From the Russian Wikipedia page

Péter Erdös ( Erdős Péter, 07/07/1925 - 02/21/1990) - Hungarian lawyer and influential official of the Kadar era, in 1970–1990 head of the Pepita label, a division of the Hungarian recording company Hungaroton (MHV), member of the Censorship Committee.

Peter Erdös was born in Budapest in 1925, his mother Olga Grünhut was a seamstress, and Imre’s father Mihai Erdös worked as an employee at a bank. When the boy was 2 years old, his father left the family, and he and his mother had to make ends meet. After graduating from high school in 1943, Peter went to work as an apprentice in a tailoring workshop. During the repressions of 1944, the Nazis arrested him because of Jewish origin and sent him to forced labor. Then Peter was deported to Germany, was imprisoned in the Sachsenhausen and Buchenwald concentration camps. When in 1945, US troops liberated the camp, he weighed only 39 kg.

In 1945, the Communists came to power in Hungary, who held regular mass repressions. Then Peter was the editor of the magazine "Sun of Hungary" and a teacher at the College of Dramatic Arts. He categorically did not support the regime that was established in the country by the dictator Matthias Rakosi, so in 1950 he was arrested on a false espionage charge. Peter spent three years in solitary confinement, after which he joined the democratic opposition, becoming a member of the underground " Petefi Circle ". He also worked on the opposition radio channel, which tuned the youth of Hungary against the dictatorship of Matthias Rakosi and for carrying out reforms. This resulted in mass unrest and uprising in the autumn of 1956., which was suppressed by the troops of the USSR. Erdosh grabbed and again sent to jail for 2 years. However, after some time, the decision from Moscow Matthias Rakosi was removed from the leadership of the country, and Janos Kadar became the new head of Hungary. He carried out partly democratic reforms in Hungary, and Peter came under an amnesty, after which from 1960 to 1966 he studied law at the evening faculty of law in the Budapest University.

In 1968, Peter Erdös was appointed General Counsel and Head of the Press Department of the MHV (Hungarian Record Company). In 1970, several sub-labels were created within the state label Hungaroton, including Pepita, whose specialization was mainly light popular music. Peter Erdös was appointed head of Pepita, who during the 1970s won great prestige in the field of pop music and was nicknamed Popcézár. In addition, he was a member of the Censorship Committee and actively fought with those Hungarian artists whose work was overly aggressive or amoral. For example, according to his order in 1972, the album “Two hundred years after the last war” was not allowed to be released by the rock group “ Omega”, And in 1973 the Alligátor band of the legendary Hungarian guitarist Bela Radic fell under the ban. In 1980, Peter stopped the "rebel bands" of the "Hobo Blues Band", " P. Mobil " and " Beatrice " with their concert program "Black Sheep" ("Fekete Bárányok"), and in 1983 brought charges against punk rock -groups “CPg”, whose members were arrested and sent to prison for “unconstitutional activities”.

In 1976, Peter came to the conclusion that Hungary may well have its own world-class disco music. To implement this plan, he selected the most suitable performers for this purpose: the singer Judit Syuch and the groups Neoton & Kócbabák and Kati és a Kerek Perec. He made the main bet on “Neoton & Kócbabák”, however after the first acquaintance with the group he came to the conclusion that she lacked cohesion. “It’s not enough to have talent, you also need to know how to work in a team,” said Popzazar. In his opinion, to achieve success it is necessary that the group is a creative family, whose members work together to achieve a common goal. The producer decided to create such a professional family on the basis of “ Neoton& Kócbabák ”, and so that his idea was better deposited in the heads of the musicians, he secured it in the new name of the group“ Neoton Familia ”. In 1979, the Neoton Família won the Grand Prix at MIDEM.Festival in Cannes (France), after which Peter opened the doors to the markets of Western Europe, Asia and Latin America. The group gained world fame, its albums and singles were released in 25 countries and hit the charts in Spain, Germany, Denmark, Brazil, Argentina, Japan and South Korea. As a result, the MHV leadership acknowledged that Peter Erdös is working in the right direction and spending public money for good reason. Around the same time, Judit Süc acquired the status of disco queen of Hungary, but her fame was much more modest, and her records were distributed only in Eastern European countries. As for the group “Kati és a Kerek Perec”, after the success of “Neoton Familia” Popesazar stated that “there is no need for two groups playing in identical styles,” and deprived it of state support.

Peter Erdös publicly admitted that he has two passions: politics and women. There were about a dozen permanent partners in his life alone. The first wife of Peter was Erzhebet Köves (Köves Erzsébet), secretary of Geza Losonczy, minister of press and propaganda of the revolutionary government of Imre Nadj in 1956. He was married to her twice because he divorced her for the time he spent in prison. Their daughter Agnes Hankish (Hankiss Ágnes, born in 1950) later became a member of the European Parliament. In the 60s, Peter's second wife was a lawyer, Judith Lahel (Lehel Judit). Then there were actress Gabi Yobba (Jobba Gabi), ballerina Erzhi Gombyoko (Gombkötő Erzsi) and pediatrician Anna Dobos (Dobos Anna). In 1979, after the victory of “Neoton Família” in Cannes, Peter proposed the lead vocalist of the group Iva Pal to become his partner, but she categorically refused. In 1980, he made a similar proposal to another vocalist of the group Ewe Chepregi, and until 1984 she was his cohabitant. At the same time, Anna Dobosh still continued to be Peter's wife, and they actually lived in three of them, and Anna treated Eve as her sister. Because of this, and also because of a significant difference in age (31 years), Erdös’s relationship with Chepregi was regularly attacked in the press: [2]the newspapers were filled with poisonous articles about what kind of “family” Popzazar had in mind, and that Chepregg made her career only because of his patronage. For moral reasons, Peter was even forced to resign for a while, but the MHV Directorate did not accept her and, after a thorough consideration of the case, issued a resolution stating that no abuse of her position was detected by Erdos. However, in the summer of 1981, by the decision of the director of MHV Bors Jenő, in addition to Pepita, two new brands were created to record pop music - Start and Krém, which were managed by other managers.

In 1982, Peter Erdos offered the singer Zsuzherkhati(Cserháti Zsuzsa, born in 1948) become a backing vocalist with Eva Chepregi in the group Neoton Família. At that time, Zhuzha was a fairly successful pop singer, who had about a dozen hits and a few successful performances at various music competitions. She had a unique vocal and good artistic data, thanks to which she was often shown on television. Many famous Hungarian authors and composers wrote songs for her, but at the same time, Zhuzha was striving for independence and repeatedly stressed that she had achieved everything in life herself. Peter Erdös’s proposal insulted the singer, and she proudly replied to the official that “some people, apparently, simply envied her popularity,” and she would not become a backing vocalist for Chepregi under any conditions, and when Erd Эs threatened she will have difficulties with recordings and performances, publicly called him a blackmailer. After that, Popzazar actually broke the career of the recalcitrant singer and for several years did not give her any opportunity to work. Zhuzha, like many other Hungarian performers, "repressed" by Erdös, was able to return to the stage only after the death of an official in 1990.