Jan Hanuš

For the football player, see Jan Hanuš (footballer).

Jan Hanuš (May 2, 1915 – July 30, 2004) was a prolific Czech composer of the 20th century. Almost every category of composition is represented among his works, many of which are overtly political, expressing in turn anti-Nazi, anti-Fascist and anti-Communist sentiments.

Contents

Biography

Hanuš studied composition independently with Otakar Jeremiáš while attending school at the Prague Conservatory, where he graduated in 1940. He subsequently studied at a business school, and then worked as an editor and an editor-in-chief of several major publishing houses, including F. A. Urbánek & Sons, and Panton (Müller 2001). It is notable to mention that as an editor he played an important role in overseeing the editions of the collected works of Antonín Dvořák and Zdeněk Fibich, both of whom he later emulated in his works, as well as the complet works of Leoš Janáček (Müller 2001). Hanuš's early works principally aimed at the passionately pathetic, the philosophic, and the patriotic, such as are exhibited in his opera The Flames. The first post-war decade witnessed lyricism, near to national tradition, but since the late fifties a new tendency of dramaticism in his works arose and a musically expressive innovation, reaching as far as the combination of traditional classics with electronics (exhibited in the opera The Torch of Prometheus) was born. The seventies and eighties were the periods of synthesis of all his preceding advances. Much of Hanuš's work is inspired by the work of Czech authors, most notably Jaroslav Seifert (Müller 2001).

After the Velvet revolution in 1989 Hanuš returned all the honours bestowed on him by the Communist regime. In 1999 Václav Havel rewarded Hanuš with a 'Za zásluhy' medal. During the 1950s Hanuš bravely and publicly defended his friend Rudolf Margolius who was the victim of the Slánský trial.

Selection of Works

Operas

Symphonies

Orchestral Works

Solo and Orchestral Works

Chamber music

Literature

Hanuš, Jan. 1996. Labyrint svět: svědectví z konce času. Prague: Odeon. ISBN 80-207-0525-2.

See also

References