1881
Born in Nagyszentmiklós, Hungary (now Sinnicolau Mare, Romania) on March 25.
1886
Begins piano lessons with his mother.
1888
Death of his father.
1889
Moves to Nagyszollow (now Vinogradov, Ukraine), where his mother takes a job as a schoolteacher.
1890
Writes his earliest compositions.
1894
Moves to Pozsony (now Bratislava, Slovakia).
1899
Moves to Budapest, commences studies in piano and composition at the Academy of Music.
1903
Writes his first major work, the Kossuth Symphony . Graduates from the Academy of Music.
1905
Starts folk music collaboration with Zoltán Koldáy.
1906
Starts annual expeditions collecting folk music using an Edison phonograph.
1907
Appointed as a piano teacher at the Academy of Music.
1907-09
Writes String Quartet No. 1.
1908
Fourteen Bagatelles.
1909
Marries Márta Ziegler.
1910
Birth of first son, Béla Bártok.
19 March 1910
Bártok's first composer's evening in the Royal Concert Hall featuring the primere of the String Quartet No. 1 by the Waldbauer-Kerpely String Quartet. With a similar debut concert by Kodály two days earlier a manifesto for the new Hungarian music had now been presented.
1911
Writes Bluebeard's Castle .
1912
Writes Four Pieces for Orchestra .
1913
Travels to Biskra, Algeria to collect folk music.
1914-16
Writes The Wooden Prince .
1915
Living in Rákoskeresztúr.
1915-17
Writes String Quartet No. 2.
3 March 1918
Priemere of the String Quartet No. 2 by the Waldbauer-Kerpely Quartet.
1918-19
Writes The Miraculous Mandarin .
1919
Member of the Music Directorate of the short-lived Communist Republic of Councils. (The other members are Koldáy and Dohnányi).
1921
Completes bookThe Hungarian Folksong .
1921-22
Writes the two sonatas for violin and piano.
1923
Divorced from Márta Ziegler; marries Ditta Pásztory.
1924
Birth of second son, Peter Bartók.
1926
Writes Piano Concerto No. 1 and a number of solo piano works including the Sonata and Out of Doors .
1927
Writes String Quartet No. 3.
1927-28
First American tour.
1928
Writes String Quartet No. 4 and the two violin rhapsodies.
1930
Writes Cantata Profana .
1931
Writes Piano Concerto No. 2.
1934
Writes String Quartet No. 5. Leaves his professorship at the Academy of Music and is appointed by the Academy of Sciences to work on the edition of Hungarian folk songs.
1936
Writes Music for Strings, Percussion, and Celesta . Conducts ethnomusicological research in Turkey.
1937
Writes Sonata for Two Pianos and Percussion .
1938
Writes Contrasts and the Violin Concerto.
1939
Death of his mother. Writes Divertimento and String Quartet No. 6.
1940
Second American tour in the spring. In the fall, Bartók emigrates to the United States.
1941
Takes post as a research fellow at Columbia University working on Serbo-Croatian folk music.
1942
Writes Concerto for Orchestra .
1944
Writes Sonata for Solo Violin.
1945
Writes Piano Concerto No. 3, begins the Viola Concerto. Dies of leukemia in New York on September 26.
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