The Gázsa Ensemble is one of Hungary's most outstanding musical groups, touring the globe throughout the last several years, accompanying the world-famous Budapest Folk Ensemble. They toured the USA in 2000 with the critically acclaimed production of "CSÁRDÁS, The Tango of the East." Reviewers raved about their performance, offering praises such as "admirable," "compelling," "seductive," "wild," "pulsating," "brilliant," "irresistible," and "superb."

The Gázsa Band was formed in 1992 by some of the best folk musicians in Hungary who have spent years studying and learning authentic village music from famous masters of folk music, who, in most cases, lived in remote rural areas. The bands takes its name from its leader's nick-name, István Papp. He was born and raised in Transylvania and has played with many "giants" of Hungarian folk music. A graduate of the Conservatory of Music of Kolozsvár [Cluj in Romanian], Gázsa was influential in starting and providing music for the first Táncház [Community folkdance event] in Kolozsvár while he was a student. This was a significant step, since this folk-revival movement offered the basic impulse to hundreds of young musicians to learn and preserve authentic folk music of the Carpathian Basin.

The Carpathian mountains surround an area of Central Europe, "home" to many ethnic groups, each possessing wonderful folklore, especially in the areas of folk music and dance. Hungarians represent the majority in those areas, but Romanian, Slovak, Serbian, Croatian, Ukrainians, Gypsies and others have also preserved their wonderful folk treasures. The most pure and archaic forms of music and dance may be found in Transylvania, now part of Romania. In these areas, Hungarians, Romanians and Gypsies live together in many villages; their unique ethnic culture may be witnessed even today. Although the performers in the Gázsa Ensemble are all Hungarians, they have explored the beauty and depth of all traditional cultures in the Carpathian Basin in great detail. In their performance, they show the music and dance of a variety of ethnic groups and offer a memorable cross-section of the colorful ethnic music and dances of all people living in Central Europe.

The Gázsa Ensemble has accompanied the famous Budapest Ensemble for a decade. Together, they have performed in many countries, including the United States, Canada and Mexico, to critical acclaim. In their 2000 North American tour, The Ensemble was praised by The New York Times as "admirable" and "compelling"; the New York Newsday noted "superb musicians ... lively, seductive music"; The Boston Globe praised their music to be "pulsating"; and in the Chicago Sun Times, the group's fiddlers were called "irresistible" and the musicians "superb."

On this tour, the Ensemble consists of six musicians and two dancers. The musicians include two violin players, a violist, a bassist, a cimbalom [Hungarian hammered dulcimer] player and a multi-instrumentalist specializing on the woodwinds, including the clarinet. A professional dancing couple from the Budapest Ensemble, wearing the gorgeous folk costumes of several geographic areas, will enhance the appreciation of the wonderful music.