Fifties jive (and all that jazz)

To Margit Island Saturday night for a concert billed as 60s–70s rock, apparently.

I'd been given the tip by an English couple at the tram stop. Since, unusually, the trams weren't operating anywhere, I decided to walk to the middle of the Island and give it a try.

Perhaps this would be a revival of The Searchers, Freddie and the Dreamers – maybe even The Eagles would drop in for the evening, I mused.

(There's no lack of rock talent available in Budapest most weekends - plus this year's Sziget Festival brought 500 bands to eleven stages for seven days.)

The reality of this concert, however, was rather different.

The venue was a (possibly collectivist era) concrete exhibition centre with stepped outdoor seating attached that faced the stage. The theme was predominantly 50s jive. And the presentation involved a large, loud swing orchestra in red jackets, colourful stage dancers doing choreographed twirls, and a middle-aged compère in glitter-jacket and dark glasses.

The whole evening was in Hungarian and the seating was pretty much full.

Now I may be sounding somewhat cynical, but, as we expats frequently say: nem ertem – I just didn't get it.

The main act seemed to be another middle-aged swinger, very well-known to the audience, who crooned through rather a lot of ballads that clearly had deep meaning for most.

A number of the tunes sounded vaguely familiar, such as 'Lonely Blue Boy' (check it out). The sound was big and the professional dancing lively. But, unlike the over-excited, seat-jiving woman next to me, I couldn't really get into this particularly dated Hungarian era.

I suppose every genre and every performer has a following. Cliff Richard could still fill the Albert Hall, I understand. But like the Hungarian's love for jazz, there must be a historical connection with Hungarian Big Band Jive that I'm just missing.

I left early, passing through idolising fans jiving in the isles.