Marek Kopelent
Marek Kopelent was a Czech composer, music editor and academic teacher, who is considered to have been at the forefront of the "New Music" movement, and was one of the most-published Czech composers of the second half of the 20th century.
After studies in Prague, he worked as a music editor. In 1959 he became interested in European avantgarde music and incorporated its developments in his style. He received international recognition when his String Quartet No. 3 was performed at festivals throughout Europe. He co-founded and directed a contemporary music ensemble in Prague, Musica Viva Pragensis, and composed chamber music for them. He studied further for one year in West Berlin on a scholarship by Deutscher Akademischer Austausch Dienst. When he returned, politics had changed to censorship of contemporary music; he lost his job, and his music was banned. For 15 years, he worked as an accompanist at a music school, and composed pieces for foreign commissions that he could not hear being performed. In 1989, he was able to return, and was appointed professor of composition at the Academy of Fine Arts in Prague. He was chairman of the Czech section of the International Society for Contemporary Music.
His compositions focus on chamber music, concertante music, and vocal music from solo songs to oratorios, based on a wide range of texts from medieval to contemporary. He received international awards.
Life and career
Early life
Kopelent was born in Prague, Czechoslovakia, on 28 April 1932. His father František Kopelent was a lawyer, and his mother was a French teacher. The boy and his sister were schooled in French. From 1951 to 1955 Kopelent studied composition with Jaroslav Řídký at the Academy of Performing Arts in Prague. He followed the late-Romantic style of his teacher in an orchestral piece concluding his studies, Satanela. He then worked from 1956 as a music editor for contemporary music for the Supraphon publishing house.1959
From 1959, Kopelent noticed increasingly the styles of the Second Viennese School and the European avant-garde movement. He read books such as Ctirad Kohoutek's New Compositional Theories of Western European Music, listened at the Warsaw Autumn to music and met Czech composers, Witold Lutosławski, Krzysztof Penderećki and others, and had personal contacts with Western European composers including Luigi Nono and Karlheinz Stockhausen. He absorbed influences and reflected them in his works. The first piece to come to the attention of the musical world outside of Czechoslovakia was his Third String Quartet, in large part due to the interpretation of the piece by the Novák Quartet which performed it throughout Europe. In the 1960s, Kopelent became well known in contemporary European music circles, with his compositions being performed at such festivals as Warsaw Autumn, Donaueschinger Musiktage, Wittener Tage für neue Kammermusik and the annual Darmstädter Ferienkurse.1965–1973
From 1965 to 1973, Kopelent served as an artistic director of the contemporary music ensemble Musica Viva Pragensis, which had been founded by Petr Kotík in 1961. It was conducted by his colleague Zbyněk Vostřák, and for which he wrote several chamber pieces for the ensemble. In the Prague musical life of the 1960s, both the ensemble and the composers associated with it rose in importance, developing into the Prague Group of New Music, which brought together composers, musicologists and players, in opposition to the official Czech composers' association.In 1969, Kopelent accepted a scholarship from the Deutscher Akademischer Austausch Dienst, which included a one-year artistic internship in West Berlin. In the meantime, the situation in Czechoslovakia changed following the Prague Spring, and New Music was less accepted. In 1971 Kopelent lost his job as editor, and his music was banned by the Czechoslovak government for twenty years. He was ostracized by the new Union of Composers, and his ensemble Musica viva Pragensis was not permitted by the authorities to pursue its concert activity.
1976
In 1976, Kopelent accepted a job as a piano accompanist for a children's dance schools in Radotin, where he remained for 15 years. During the 1970s he composed many pieces, a number of them for foreign commissions, but, as he could not leave Czechoslovakia, he was unable to hear their performances.1989
After the Velvet Revolution in 1989, Kopelent became a music advisor in the office of president Váćlav Havel. In 1991 he was appointed professor of composition at the musical faculty of Academy of Fine Arts in Prague, a position he retained. He was a co-founder and chairman of the Czech section of the International Society for Contemporary Music, and was chairman of the Atelier 90 composers' association.Kopelent was the organiser and a regular lecturer to International Composers' Summer Courses, held in Český Krumlov. Among his students were Czech composer, recipient of a stabat mater at the national competition of young composers, Czech composer, First Prize in the 1993 national competition of young composers, Ukrainian composer Svitlana Azarova, and Latvian composer Ēriks Ešenvalds.
Kopelent died in Prague on 12 March 2023, at age 90, at the Motol University Hospital after a short illness.
Compositions
Kopelent's works include five string quartets, oratorios and concertante works. They have appeared in a number of compilations of Czech composers. He was one of the most-published Czech composers in the second half of the 20th century.His works include:
Orchestral and vocal orchestral works
Satanela, symphonic poem for orchestra, based on a poem by Jaroslav Vrchlický, Library of the Academy of Music- Symphony, Breitkopf & HärtelPazdravení, overture, Breitkopf & HärtelChléb a Ptáci, cantata for contralto, recitation, mixed choir and orchestra, text: poem by Jan Skácel, Czech Music Fund Laudatio pacis, by P. H. Dittrich, Sofia Gubaydulina and Kopelent, oratorio for soprano, contralto, tenor, bass and recitation soloists, chamber choir, mixed choir and orchestra to texts by Jan Amos Komenský Legend – "De passione St. Adalberti Martyris", oratorio for recitation, mixed choir and orchestra to a Latin text of an ancient Bohemian legend, CHFOna skutecne jest, for tenor, bass, recitation, mixed choir, children's choir and orchestra, text by Vladimír Holan Messaggio della bontà, oratorio for soprano and baritone, recitation, children's choir, mixed choir and orchestra, Breitkopf & HärtelLux mirandae sanctitatis, oratorio for soprano, recitation, mixed choir, children's choir and instrumental ensemble, Supraphon Judex ergo for Requiem of Reconciliation, 1995ARÍÍJAh, for orchestra, Zastřený Hlas Nad Hladinou Klidu, for trumpet and chamber orchestra
Concertante compositions
Appassionato, for piano and orchestra, Breitkopf & HärtelSváry, for a group of twelve instruments and orchestra, CHFA Few Minutes With an Oboist, concerto galante for oboe and chamber ensemble, Breitkopf & HärtelHrátky, for alto saxophone and orchestra, Breitkopf & HärtelIl canto de li augei, arias for soprano and orchestra to Italian lyrics by Renaissance poets, Breitkopf & HärtelLibá hubda s sidovým motivem, Breitkopf & Härtel- Concertino for cor anglais and chamber ensemble, Breitkopf & HärtelMusique concertante, for cello, 12 cellos and orchestra, SU
Music for chamber orchestra or ensemble
Rozjímání, for chamber orchestra, Breitkopf & Härtel + SU'Nénie with flute for the late Hana Hlavsová, for flute, nine female voices and chamber ensemble, Schott Music Panton- String Quartet No. 3, SU
- Quintet for oboe, clarinet, bassoon, viola and piano, Breitkopf & HärtelPocta Vladimíru Holanovi for nonet
- String Quartet No. 4, Breitkopf & HärtelZátiší for chamber ensemble, Breitkopf & HärtelIntimissimo, music and a poem for chamber ensemble and tape recording of a poem by Paul Fort, Breitkopf & Härtel, Styrian Autumn
- Brass Quintet, Breitkopf & Härtel
- Sonata for 11 stringed instruments, Breitkopf & Härtel
- Rondo "Před příchodem roztomilých katů aneb trojí klanění naději" for five percussion instruments, Breitkopf & HärtelToccata for harp, harpsichord and dulcimer, Breitkopf & HärtelTriste a consolante for wind quintet of new or early instruments ad lib., Breitkopf & HärtelMusica lirica for flute, violin and piano Furiant for piano trio
- String Quartet No. 5, Breitkopf & HärtelÊtres fins en mouvement for 6 percussionists, Breitkopf & HärtelEines Tages, for 6 cellos, Breitkopf & Härtel Romanze for 2 pianos, SULe petit rien, for piccolo flute and percussion
Music for solo instruments
Pro Arnošta Wilda, for piano, Breitkopf & Härtel- Hallelujah, for organ, Breitkopf & HärtelBijou de bohème for harpsichord, Breitkopf & Härtel
- Ballad for piano, Breitkopf & Härtel
- Capriccio for trumpet, Breitkopf & HärtelJitřní chvalozpěv for organ, Breitkopf & HärtelCanto intimo for flute and vibraphone, Edition Modern, MunichMusique piquante for violin and dulcimer, Breitkopf & Härtel
- Toccata for viola and piano, Breitkopf & HärtelLe petit rien, for piccolo and percussion Karrak for cello and piano Canto espansivo for clarinet, SUPer Aminko for harpsichord, RitornelCantus rogas for cello Der Gnade Freude for organ
Vocal music
Písně rozhořčené for baritone and piano to poems by Petrarca, CHFMiniaturní písně for baritone and piano to ancient Japanese poems Snehah for soprano, jazz contralto, tape recording and chamber ensemble, SUBludný hlas for an actress, tape recording, chamber ensemble, film and light ad lib., Black and White Tears for solo voice, Breitkopf & HärtelNářek ženy, melodrama for an actress, 7 brass instruments, 14 female voices and a children's choir, texts by the composer and M. Procházková, CHFVrh kostek, for 4 reciters and tape, to a poem by Mallarmé Zjitřený zpěv for baritone and brass quintet, text by Josef Hora, CHF- Agnus Dei, for soprano and chamber ensemble to texts by Martin Luther, Breitkopf & HärtelMon Amour, for soprano, tenor, chamber ensemble, and female choir, to texts by Marc Chagall, SUDer Augenblick for soprano, flute and piano, to texts by Andreas Gryphius, SULe chant du merle au détenu, for mezzo-soprano, flute, accordion and piano, to poems by Jan Zahradníček, SUHolanovská reminiscence for mezzo-soprano, recitation, choir, clarinet, trombone and piano, to poems by Vladimír Holan Cantus de dilectione filiarum Dei for 5 sopranos, baritone, and 3 trombones to texts by Thérèse de Lisieux
- ''Ze zápisníku Nataši H.''
Choral music
Matka, frescoes for mixed choir with flute, Pa and DGG 11'Modlitby kamene for a reciter, 2 mixed chamber choirs and 3 tom-toms, to a poem by Vladimír Holan, Breitkopf & HärtelŽaloby for mixed choir, trumpet and timpani ad lib., Breitkopf & HärtelSyllabes mouvementées for chamber choir, Vacillat pes meus for mixed choir to words from the Book of Psalms, Breitkopf & HärtelPíseň kratochvilná for mixed choir, to a text by the Bohemian chronicler Lukáš Volný Regina lucis, for mixed choir to a text from the Czech Franus hymnal from the late 15th century, Breitkopf & HärtelCantus supplex for 12 vocalists to a medieval text, Breitkopf & HärtelAlouette for 12 vocalists to the poem by Carmen Bernos de Gasztold, SUCantus pro defunctis, for medium voice, SUAppels for 12 vocalists and 3 percussion players Cantus de navitate filii for medium voicesMusic for children's choir
- Four songs to poems by Vítězslav Nezval, for children's choir and piano Dotty Ditties for children's choir, to texts by the composer Svítání, for a large children's choir, SUCantus simplex, for children's choir