After completing his studies with Zoltán Kodály, and later Paul Hindemith, he worked in Sopron. At the beginning of the 1940s he was appointed Professor at the Liszt Academy in Budapest, where he made an outstanding contribution to many areas of musical study, and today many of his former students are playing a key role in Hungarian musical life.

In addition to being a prolific composer, Gárdonyi was also a fine musicologist. His published researches into the music of Bach and Liszt are landmarks of their kind, and are still today held in great esteem by scholars worldwide. His wide-ranging creative output includes symphonies, concertos, chamber music, organ pieces, sacred choral music and cantatas. This monograph is the first publication to provide a comprehensive overview of the man and his music.