Liszt Ferenc Zeneművészeti Egyetem, Budapest

The Franz Liszt Academy of Music is the institution and concert hall occupying this celebrated building. It began on 14 November 1875, founded by Franz Liszt himself, and it now combines advanced music education with Budapest’s concert life. The building you see was designed by Flóris Korb and Kálmán Giergl and completed in 1907.

Its façade is dominated by a statue of Liszt by Alajos Stróbl, while the interiors bring together frescoes, Zsolnay ceramics, and sculptures of musicians including Béla Bartók and Frédéric Chopin. This is also Budapest’s earliest public building made with a reinforced-concrete structure, an engineering achievement built into the academy’s history. Inside, the institution preserves the Liszt Collection: valuable books and manuscripts that Liszt donated before his death.

The academy also includes the AVISO studio, created through cooperation between Hungary and Japan to give students recording equipment and training. So this is not simply a music school or a performance venue: it is a working university, a concert hall, and a material link to its founder, with Liszt’s image presiding over the façade.