Vítězslava Kaprálová


Vítězslava Kaprálová was a Czech composer and conductor of 20th-century classical music.
WWW kapralova.org

Life and career

Vítězslava Kaprálová was born in Brno, Moravia, Austria-Hungary, a daughter of composer Václav Kaprál and singer Vítězslava Kaprálová. From 1930 to 1935 she studied composition with Vilém Petrželka and conducting with Zdeněk Chalabala at the Brno Conservatory. She continued her musical education with Vítězslav Novák and Václav Talich in Prague and with Bohuslav Martinů, Charles Munch and, according to some unverified accounts, with Nadia Boulanger in Paris. In 1937 she conducted the Czech Philharmonic and a year later the BBC Orchestra in her composition Military Sinfonietta. Her husband was the Czech writer Jiří Mucha, whom she married two months before she died.
Despite her untimely death, which may have been caused by typhoid fever, in Montpellier, France at the age of 25, Kaprálová created an impressive body of work. Her music was admired by Rafael Kubelík, who premiered her orchestral song Waving Farewell and also conducted her other orchestral works. Among the many interpreters of her piano music was pianist Rudolf Firkušný, for whom Kaprálová composed her best known piano work Dubnová preludia. In 1946, in appreciation of her distinctive contribution, the foremost academic institution in the country—the Czech Academy of Sciences and the Arts - awarded Kaprálová membership in memoriam. By 1948 this honour was bestowed on only 10 women, out of 648 members of the Academy.
The only English language monograph on the composer was published in 2011 by Lexington Books in the United States. The book also includes an annotated catalog of her works.
Kaprálová was "Composer of the Week" on BBC Radio 3 from Monday 12 October to Friday 16 October 2015, a set of five one-hour programs playing her music and discussing her life.
In 2021, Kaprálová was among the 58 personalities featured by the exhibition Portraits de France, organized under the auspices of Emmanuel Macron in Paris, from December 1, 2021 to February 14, 2022. The 29 women and 29 men made the final cut from the original 318 nominees to be commemorated and celebrated for their contribution to the "national narrative of France."

Compositions

Kaprálová's catalogue includes her highly regarded art songs and music for piano solo, and a string quartet, a reed trio, music for cello, music for violin and piano, an orchestral cantata, two piano concertos, two orchestral suites, a sinfonietta, and a concertino for clarinet, violin, and orchestra. Much of her music was published during her lifetime and continues to be published today by various publishing houses, including Schott and Bärenreiter Verlag. In addition, her music has been released on record and compact disc by a variety of labels, including Chandos, Naxos, Koch International, Albany Records, Centaur Records, Delos Productions, Gramola, Claves Records, Supraphon, and many others.

Legacy

The Kapralova Society

Kaprálová's legacy has been promoted by the Kapralova Society, a music society founded in 1998 in Toronto, Canada. The society has been also seeking to redress the gender imbalance in classical music through public education and Kapralova Society Journal, "a journal of women in music".

In popular culture

List of compositions

Selected worksSuite en miniature, op. 1 for small orchestra
  • Two Compositions for Violin and Piano, op. 3Two Songs, op. 4
  • Song cycle Sparks from Ashes, op. 5January, for voice, flute, two violins, violoncello and pianoSonata Appassionata, op. 6 for piano
  • Piano Concerto in D Minor, op. 7
  • String Quartet, op. 8
  • Grotesque Passacaglia for piano
  • Three Piano Pieces, op. 9
  • Song cycle Apple from the Lap, op. 10Sad Evening, for voice and large orchestraMilitary Sinfonietta, op. 11 for large orchestra
  • Song cycle Forever, op. 12April Preludes, op. 13 for pianoWaving Farewell, op. 14 for voice and piano / large orchestra
  • Trio for Oboe, Clarinet, and BassoonIlena, op. 15. Cantata for soli, mixed choir, reciter and large orchestraVariations sur le carillon de l'église St-Étienne-du-Mont, op. 16 for pianoTwo Choruses for Women's Voices a cappella, op. 17Elegy, for violin and pianoSuita Rustica, op. 19 for large orchestra
  • Partita, op. 20 for strings and piano
  • Concertino for Violin, Clarinet and Orchestra, op. 21
  • Song cycle Sung into the Distance, op. 22Deux ritournelles, op. 25 for violoncello and piano

Selected discography

  • Orchestral Works
  • Orchestral Music
  • Complete piano music
  • Music for piano / piano and violin
  • Art songs
  • String quartet

Books

  • Gates, Eugene and Karla Hartl, eds. The Women in Music Anthology. Toronto: The Kapralova Society, 2021.
  • Hartl, Karla and Erik Entwistle, eds. The Kaprálová Companion. Lanham, MD: Lexington Books, 2011.

Dissertations and Master's theses

Articles

  • Cheek, Timothy. "Navždy Kaprálová: Reevaluating Czech composer Vítězslava Kaprálová through her thirty songs." Kapralova Society Journal 3, no. 2 : 1-6.
  • Cheek, Timothy. "Sad Evening, Great Discovery: Bringing to Light a New Song by Vítězslava Kaprálová" Kapralova Society Journal 12, no. 1 : 1-7.
  • Egeling, Stephane. "Kaprálová’s Trio for oboe, clarinet and bassoon." Kapralova Society Journal 9, no. 2 : 5-8.
  • Entwistle, Erik. "To je Julietta. Martinů, Kaprálová and Musical Symbolism." Kapralova Society Newsletter 2, no. 2 : 1-15.
  • Fischer, Christine. "Ending Republican Gender Politics: Kaprálová's Cantata Ilena." Kapralova Society Journal 18, no. 2 : 1–11.
  • Hartl, Karla. "Kaprálová as a Composer of the Week. The BBC Interview." Journal of Czech and Slovak Music 29 : 204–221.
  • Hartl, Karla. "The Power of Advocacy in Music: The Case of Vítězslava Kaprálová." Journal of Czech and Slovak Music 27 : 4–32.
  • Houtchens, Alan. "Love's Labour's Lost: Martinů, Kaprálová and Hitler." In Irish Musical Studies 4, pp. 127–132. Edited by Patrick F. Devine & Harry White. Dublin: Four Courts Press, 1996.
  • Jandura, Tereza. "Kaprálová’s Jablko s klína, op. 10." Kapralova Society Journal 9, no. 1 : 1-11.
  • Kostaš, Martin. "An Analysis of Compositional Methods Applied in Kaprálová’s Cantata Ilena, op. 15." Kapralova Society Journal 10, no. 1 : 1–6.
  • Koukl, Giorgio. "Vítězslava Kaprálová: Two Dances for Piano, op. 23. An attempt at reconstruction of the autograph." Kapralova Society Journal 18, no. 1 : 8–12.
  • Latour, Michelle. "Kaprálová’s song Leden." Kapralova Society Journal 9, no. 1 : 1-4.
  • Latour, Michelle. "Kaprálová’s Vteřiny, op. 18." Kapralova Society Journal 10, no. 1 : 7–10.
  • Svatos, Thomas D. "On the Literary Reception of Kaprálová and Martinů: Jiří Mucha's Peculiar Loves and Miroslav Barvík's 'At Tři Studně.'" Zwischentöne 2 : 71-90.
  • Vejvarová, Michaela. "Vítězslava Kaprálová's Last Concertino." Czech Music 4 : 6-7.