József Eötvös (musician)

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József Eötvös (born 1962 in Pécs, Hungary) is a classical guitarist. He studied with Roland Zimmer and Franz Just at the Franz Liszt Academy in Weimar. From 1985 to 1988 he won several international competitions and then toured widely across Europe. He is known for transcribing and recording Bach’s Goldberg Variations in the original key, a difficult feat for guitar. He also recorded Bach’s Art of the Fugue for two eight‑string guitars and transcribed many of Bach’s lute works. These projects, along with recordings of Chopin’s piano works and Brahms’ Hungarian Dances, helped expand the guitar repertoire. Eötvös has given many master classes and often serves on juries at guitar competitions. He is the artistic director of the International Guitar Festivals in Esztergom and Balatonfüred, Hungary. Since 2002 he has taught at the Franz Liszt Academy of Music in Budapest and was the first in Hungary to establish a guitar faculty at university level. In 2002 he won the Artisjus Prize for promoting contemporary Hungarian music, and in 2004 the Franz Liszt Prize. He is also a composer, with works such as Willow Variations (1991), Five Aphorisms (1997), and Featherlets (2000).