You have just spent four months in Mexico, mostly relaxing. Was it difficult to come back?
Ever since I was 16, my life has been spent in studios, playing concerts and being in groups. And even though in recent years, I would take month-long breaks, I now felt it was time to stop to think over what has happened so far and what I?d like to achieve in the future. A friend of mine took me to a small Mexican village in 2006 and said it was a good place to think, write and do nothing. At first I did not understand what it was all about. But then I remember standing on the beach, in front of a white cliff, the Roca Blanca, at full moon and I felt I must return here. It was a very good move that I quit for a while. It?s not easy for a hyperactive person like me to learn to relax. But I?m moving in the right direction.
Did these four months change you in any way?
Yes, I?ve changed. I?ve slowed down. For instance I?ve decided with my manager Réka Bodnár to have a more relaxed year which means I?ll have time with my group to appreciate the success of our concerts. I used to get very stressed even from a small mistake during the preparations for concerts or recordings. And I would make a record every year. This year, I?ve written a few new songs but I now prefer to replay some old tunes because there is still a lot in them. For instance I only played around ten concerts of the Sefard material in 2009, yet, it?s a box of beautiful treasures.
Relaxing was not the only thing you were doing in Mexico. You said on your blog that you started writing a book.
I?ve been writing for a very long time and I?ve received much feedback, sometimes people would tell me their own stories. Writing for me is similar to singing: I open my mouth to have like-minded people come together. And now I write with a similar purpose. The circle is getting wider. I wanted to start off with some old texts but I write very differently now than a few years ago. The subject matter is myself, which is very simple but at the same time the greatest challenge. The genre, if I have to define it, is perhaps personal essay, with a little added fiction, some magic. The final result will be difficult to categorise, the same way as it is difficult to pigeon-hole my music. I am still at the beginning and I do not know where it will end. There are certain topics that seem to stand out for me but one thing is certain: it will not be a linear chronology. It?s not going to be a fairy-tale showing how Bea Palya got from Bag to Carnegie Hall.
Is it a memoir?
Some people would say I?m too young to write a memoir. It did not even cross my mind. I am very young but I felt like stopping a little and writing down what I?ve been through so far; somehow remoulding myself through this book. It very much signals the start of a new period. I will be 35 this year and I feel that some good things are still ahead. I have reached the stage when I feel I have grown roots in a positive sense. I am creating something through this text: myself, in a new and more visible form. What people can see on the stage or in the media about me is not necessarily a full-rounded image. My book reveals a lot of new details. Some people have asked whether I would have the courage to write about my abortion. Well, I do, considering that I have also made a record about it and it?s a topic that affects very many women. It?s also a great challenge to write about my parents, to re-discuss with them some old stories with my current mind-set.
Is there any subject matter that has come up now in writing and you feel you would return to it in a song sometime in the future?
For instance in connection with the men in my life, the issue of former girlfriends and relationships left open is a nice topic that would deserve a song. And the Facebook phenomenon is another one. But to write about something in a song is of course very different. It must be more concise and expressed through rhyme. Whereas during writing I have noticed that very often I would write down sentences the way I would tell them to my father or to a loved one from my past. I used to feel ashamed but when I re-read these sentences, I thought: why should I feel shame when everyone says such sentences sometimes.
It sounds like a perfect course on self-consciousness?
I did recently write a part on self-consciousness. I collected the courses and methods that I felt best fit mem, but for that I also had to write down which ones I thought did not fit me. I?ve tried a lot of different things. Esoteric schools of thought and religious faith are not my way. Because I cannot believe in something without fully understanding it. But the clinical way, psychiatry are not for me, either. What I feel best is a good mixture of the instinctive and the rational. Szilárd Mosonyi starts with quantum physics and a creative reality. He says a particle will exist only if it enters the beam of my attention. Which means that the beam of my attention will create it. If I apply that to my internal world then the things I focus on will be created. I can understand that and therefore I will accept it. And then there is yoga which is a very exact science, telling you precisely what to do with the body, yet it affects not only the body but also the spirit, which is very illogical. Sometimes I?ve been described as an esoteric just because I talk about the spirit and internal affairs. I was not happy about that. Discussing internal matters brings out much more fear in everybody, including me, because one can reach such basic issues as do I have the right to exist, and other such delicacies. I redefine myself though writing and I hope that whoever reads me will see not only me in the text but also himself or herself.
Listening to your songs, many people may think that they have the same feelings as you do: I do not want to get married yet but I want to have a child, and everyone can go to hell? Do you ever get such feedback?
I often do and I enjoy that. That?s also why I?m so concrete much of the time: this song is about having been left by someone I loved, this is about how I cannot find the right man, and this one is about whether my mother can understand me. When I play concerts, I would like the audience to experience that I love them with every part of me and if they feel like being part of my game, they should. My music is not for everyone and is not always immediately suitable ? my records usually reach their aim only after a few years.
Even though you have said that you are not working on a new album now? let?s play a game? say, if you could record an album with any artist you choose, who would it be?
Those that I like, they are very powerful and praiseworthy artists. The list would certainly include Nina Simone, Joni Mitchell, Patricia Barber and I would gladly work together with Mihály Dresch. I?ve recently watched Frank in the Budapest Bar group. Even though he does something very different from me, I thought he was amazingly credible and I loved him on the stage. I always fall in love with those whose songs I feel I could die for. Björk?s song Yoga is one such song and Peter Gabriel?s new record. I would also like to sing together once with Sarah Vaughan and then there is Mayra Andrade or Imani Uzuri who was recently in Hungary as a member of Fire and Fire. I love falling in love with someone who ?radiates? like a nuclear reactor on the stage.
OK, and if you could take just one CD to a deserted island, which one would that be?
I would prepare an MP3 selection? that would include My Funny Valentine from Shirley Horn, I?m Feeling Good from Nina Simone, some Moldovan peasant singers, such as Mrs. József Ferenc Simon, and I would also add some Whitney Houston to have songs for dancing. And Lover, Lover from Leonard Cohen, and Greek and Turkish performers.
Well, that list also gives you enough material for a new album of cover songs.
These are such good songs that it would be difficult to improve on them. But I do think about a new record of cover songs. I would like to make a recording of Sándor Weöres?s Istók the Fool sometime in the future. The text is really fantastic and every shade of it, every sentence has a whole range of meanings, so I?m still trying to grow up to the task. But also in the case of Psyche, me and Samu Gryllus we thought we were too young for that. Yet, we set out and did it.
Would you do it in a different way today?
That?s perhaps my only record that I would not change at all. Technically, perhaps I?d sing a few parts differently, but that?s all. And perhaps I?d make it into fifty minutes twice because it was difficult to leave out some songs. I like that recording, it features many musicians who are still actively involved in my life today.
Yet, you are sometimes alone on the stage. For instance at your next Budapest concert, you will play the songs of Egyszálének on your own at the József Attila Cultural Centre on April 3.
I do not play that many Egyszálének shows but they always come at the right time. They demonstrate some form of self-cleansing and are therefore very different shows. After walking around on a beach for four months, I had to realise, I can be a loveable person even if I am not standing in front of a thousand people on a stage and I play fewer concerts. Because I must admit that just like all other singers, I go on stage not only because of my admiration for music but also to get people love me more.
Interviewer: Melinda Serfőző / Photos: Bence Kovács
