Radic, Bela

Bela Radic was born in the working area of ​​Budapest Tripolis. In childhood, he studied at the music school of St. Stephen. His father bought the first guitar in the fall of 1959. After high school, he studied at a diesel mechanic and at the same time worked with his father in a shipyard and played in a factory orchestra. His father died on the very day that Bela received a professional certificate. Since 1964, he was a member of the Sankó group, which by 1965 was renamed Atlantis , and at first it was difficult for the guy to combine performances with a two-shift work schedule. Despite the fact that this group was successful and in the summer of 1965 recorded as many as 4 singles, by then Radic was already nurturing the idea of ​​creating his own ensemble. In 1966, three Atlantis members - guitarist Bela Radic, bass player Zoltan Beke and organist György Roznoyi - separated and formed a new band, “Pannónia”. They were joined by drummer Jozsef Stricek and guitarist Ernö Posh. However, a year later Radic left Pannónia to organize his first independent project.

As a result, in the spring of 1968, Bela Radic created the Sakk-Matt team. ^[3] His group included vocalist Albert Harmath (Harmath Albert), bass player Lajos Mikloska (Miklóska Lajos), as well as drummer Rezho Hoenig (Hőnig Rezső) and rhythm guitarist Lajos Chuha (Csuha Lajos), previously played in " Sankó Beat Group ”, and Radic himself took the place of a solo guitarist. ^[4] The debut concert of the new group took place on May 1, 1968 in the Buda Youth Park. Their show was unprecedented: musicians raised their guitars over their heads, jumped around the stage and blinded the audience with their snow-white smiles. According to newspaper reports, the concert was about 10 thousand spectators. At the end of 1968, Rezio Hoenig joined the Szivárvány (Rainbow) band, and the new drummer was Váradi László, nicknamed Vadölő, who had previously played Scampolo and Pannónia. In the spring of 1969, the group gained great popularity, performing in the Taban quarter in the central district of Budapest on Gellert Hill . Their shows began with the song "Bélázás", which called: "Belo to the party, Belo to the government!" Thanks to this number, they became popular and found a permanent refuge and place for performances, which became the Danuvia House of Culture. There they gave concerts on weekends in front of a crowded room, performing songs by the British blues-rock band Cream and British blues-rocker Jimi Hendrix , to which the songwriter Miklos Tibor composed Hungarian texts for them. In the fall of 1969, the Sakk-Matt line-up changed again: Ferenc Demien from the Meteor band became the new vocalist. However, the first group of Bela Radic was not able to become a truly professional team, gradually contradictions grew in her, and as a result she broke up on December 20, 1969, giving a farewell concert at the Kassák club. After that, its participants scattered in different groups, but in 1972 they met in the theater at the production of the musical " Jesus Christ is a superstar ." Lajosh Chuha played the role of Jesus in this production, Lajosh Mikloshka - Judah, Albert Harmat - the king Herod, and Rezho Hoenig - all other male roles. ^[five]

On January 12, 1970, the Tűzkerék (Fire Wheel) group was created. ^[6] It included solo guitarist Bela Radic, drummer Laszlo Varadi and bass player Lomos Shom (Som Lajos) from the Record team. The name "Wheel of Fire" was proposed by a friend of Laszlo Varadi, Maria Wittek, copying it from the name of Cream's album "Wheels of Fire" (1968). In April, Ferenc Demien, who was their vocalist for six months, then joined Bergendy, joined the new band. Like “Sakk-Matt”, the newly-minted team performed mainly western hits, including Cream and Jimi Hendrix, it is also believed that “Tűzkerék” were the first in Hungary to sing “ Led Zeppelin ” songs. The musicians performed on weekends in various clubs and recreation centers of Budapest, their concerts usually took place from 18 to 22 hours. The first 2 hours the musicians performed rock and rolls, and the second 2 hours - rhythm and blues, and thus the group was "home to all styles", where "each spectator received his own layer of music." On November 20, 1970, Bela Radic’s team also gave a concert in memory of Jimi Hendrix (he died on September 18) in the New Pest Palace of Culture. By that time, Radich was called in the musical environment only the “King of Guitars” and “The Best Student of Jimi Hendrix”, respected for his own style of play, charisma and creative instincts. And the youth magazine (Ifjúsági Magazin), as usual, conducted a survey and at the end of the year, according to the results of the voting, named Radić “the best guitarist of Hungary in 1970”.

Tűzkerék concerts were held without any plan and consisted of continuous improvisations. However, this time Radic set a fairly high professional bar for other members of the group, and not everyone was able to withstand it. So in the summer of 1970, Radic said goodbye to Laszlo Varadi and took in his place the young Dejo Deme (Döme Dezső, born in 1953.). After that, Varadi tried to join the disintegrating band Metro , but soon went into a binge and finally stopped playing music. And in the fall, instead of Lajos Shoma, who joined Neoton , Szigeti András became the bass player of the group. But he did not stay in this place for long: at the beginning of 1971 he was replaced by Jozsef Könnyu (Könnyű József). ^[7] Also in the spring of 1971, two new guitarists appeared in the group: Tibor Tatrai from Kárpátia and Peter Chomosh from Hungária , who soon left for the short-lived JAM project. However, despite all the efforts of Radic, the performance of “Tűzkerék” continued to remain at a mediocre level, so the musicians could not record at the studio and take part in competitions and festivals. Since the summer of 1971, the group’s performances have become increasingly colorless, which is why Radic was constantly irritated, but no one noticed his creative crisis, which was gaining momentum. In the fall of 1971, Egon Poka (Póka Egon, born 1953) from Metro became the band’s next bass player. Also at the end of 1971, keyboardist Katalin Nagy from the Beatrice girl group joined the group. But by then Tűzkerék had already firmly “run aground”. In desperation, Bela “went on vacation” for several months, during which he tried to rethink his life, read books and even meditated. The group was dissolved, Kati Nagy left for Volán , and Egon Poka for Olympia.

At the beginning of 1972, Radic made a new team: the bass player was Zoltán Kiss from JAM, the guitarist Baracs János from Woods, and the drummer Tamés Németh from Mini. But even with these participants Tűzkerék was unable to swim out of the swamp in which it was bogged down. Suddenly, Bela Radic learned that Lajos Schom and Ferenc Balazs from Neoton are creating a new project called Taurus , which was supposed to be the first Hungarian hard rock band. Radic could not miss such a chance and joined their project, and the other members of Tűzkerék scattered among other teams: Zoltan Kisch left for Scampolo, and Janos Barac - for Kex . As a result, Taurus became the pinnacle of his professional career for Bela Radic: it was in this collective that he was able to achieve the greatest success, despite the fact that the group recorded only two singles, of which only in the creation of Zöld Csillag (The Green Star) , 1972) he participated as an author. Unfortunately, Hungary's first hard rock band lasted only one year and broke up due to disagreement between the participants. In 1973, Radic created a new project, “Alligátor”, which included, in addition to himself, drummer Andras Kishfaludi from “M7”, saxophonist keyboardist Ferenc Palankai and bass player Laszlo Klein. Like all of Radic’s previous groups, Alligator’s repertoire consisted mainly of Cream and Jimi Hendrix’s songs, but this time the musicians composed several of their own numbers, including Napfényes napok, Gonosz asszony and Csodálatos utazás . Compared to Tűzkerék, the sound of the new group was more psychedelic and “narcotic,” so after 9 months Alligátor fell under the ban of censorship committee member Peter Erdös . After that, Radic was a member of the “Aréna” and “Nevada” bands for some time, the founder of the last of which was his former drummer Deje Döme.

In 1975, Bela, along with bass player Tamas Kun (Kun Tamás) made a desperate attempt to revive his main brainchild "Tűzkerék", but this time they failed to create a stable team. On August 7, 1977, a joint nostalgia concert of former members of Tűzkerék and Taurus was held in front of thousands of fans in Buda Youth Park. After that, Radic again teamed up with drummer Dejo Döme, who continued to play in the Nevada band in 1975-76, and bass player Egon Poka, who had previously played Juventus . In this composition, in 1978, the musicians performed at the Budapest Small Stadium (Kisstadion), and then prepared and recorded the album “Tűzkerék'78” of seven compositions, five of which were re-hits of Western hits. But despite the fact that the design of the future cover was even ordered, their record never saw the light of day. On September 17, 1978, Tűzkerék gave a memorial concert in memory of Jimi Hendrix in Buda Youth Park, after which Deje Döme and Egon Poka also left Radic and left for the Hobo Blues Band.

Realizing that his project has no prospects, Bela Radic fell into a depression and became addicted to alcohol. In 1979, together with bass player Tamas Kun and drummer Laszlo Sholdosh, they staged a Tűzkerék concert, but their team was a dull sight. And their next concert at Kisstadion in 1980 caused complete disappointment among the public, it was clear that the audience applauded Radich only out of politeness and respect for his former merits. Each subsequent failure negatively affected the mood of the guitarist, who again and again fled from himself to alcoholism. As a result, in the fall of 1982, he was hospitalized and died on October 18. Above his tombstone, his fellow musicians performed an epitaph with the words: “The greatest Hungarian guitarist of all time. May it illuminate the earth! ”And on October 22, 2005, on Gyöngyösi street in the 13th district of Budapest, Radic was erected a monument, the author of which was the sculptor Kara Kovacs. Later, one of the neighboring streets received the name of a musician ^[8] .