 Petr Eben (born January 22, 1929, in Zamberk, Eastern Bohemia; died November 24, 2007, in Prague) is the best known contemporary Czech composer both at home and abroad. He was a charismatic personality with an education of unusual breadth and depthan all-around composer, performer and teacher who was also active in many other fields of art. He was the recipient of many prestigious awards including the French title, Chevalier des arts et des lettres in 1991. Many of his award-winning works, choral and organ, in particular, have become staple repertory items.
His formative years were lived in the medieval town of Cesky Krumlov where he learned to play the piano and organ. The events of World War II interrupted his musical studies. Expelled from school when the Nazis came to occupy Czechoslovakia in 1943, he, his father and relatives, were sent to the Buchenwald Concentration Camp where he remained until the camp's liberation in 1945.
Following the war, Petr Eben resumed his musical studies in earnest, entering the Prague Academy of Music and Dramatic Arts where he studied piano with Pavel Borkovec and composition with Frantisek Rauch (1948-52). His teaching career began in 1955 when he joined the faculty of Charles University in Prague.
As a teacher, Petr Eben taught composition, intonation and score playing for 35 years at the department of musicology of the Faculty of Arts and guided the development of many of the younger and middle-aged generation of Czech musicologists. From 1977-78, he was active as visiting professor of composition at the Royal Northern College of Music in Manchester, England. After the Velvet Revolution (September 1990), he was finally appointed senior lecturer in composition at the Academy of Music in Prague, becoming Professor in 1991 for several years. Official recognition of his work came on his 65th birthday when Charles University in awarded him an honorary doctorate.
Petr Eben was a piano and organ performer and appeared as soloist, chamber player, accompanist and brilliant improviser. His interpretive art, just like his compositions, earned him international renown.
Petr Eben, a composer of well over 200 works in all musical genres, including opera, developed a personally expressive musical idiom. His music proved that artistic expression firmly rooted in tradition can, at the same time, be modern and topical. With only a few exceptions, he never left the territory of tonality which, however, did not prevent him from using, in a functional and meaningful way, some serial procedures and aleatorics.
Typical of his idiom is a consistent use of historical material, forms, genres and compositional techniques of old music, giving them contemporary relevance. The scope, depth and systematic character of his interest in the forgotten values of old music are highly individual, and constitute the basis of his very original style. Plainchant and liturgical music in general, their melodic material, forms and genres, as well as texts, have been one of the chief sources of Petr Eben's inspiration from the beginning.
Eben's nationalist feelings were reflected in his use of the earliest Czech sacred and secular output as well as Czech folklore in a very individual and original way. His modern arrangements of folksongs, often intended for young people, as well as his own instructional compositions, are an equally important contribution towards Czech music, and initiate students into the world of modern music.
Never limiting himself to 'national' themes, Eben was a modern artist understanding the need for global cultural integrity. He was often inspired by international, timeless subjects, not restricted either geographically or historically. His subjects came from antiquity and biblical times, inspirations from the cultures of European and non-European cultures, historical as well as modern subjects drawing from music, literature, drama and the fine arts.
Choral Titles by Petr Eben from API
Abba-Amen SATB a cap AP-1285
Az ja pojedu & Esce si ja pohar vina (When I Will Ride) &(I'll Buy One More Glass of Wine) SATB a cap AP-1295
Ca' Hawkie Solo/SSA a cap AP-1326
Das Lieben bringt gross Freud (Loving brings great Joys) SSA a cap/Alto Recorder AP-1721
Dobru noc (Good Night) SATB a cap AP-1267
Four Polish Songs SSA/pcn a cap AP-1325
Galanecko starodavna & Proc si k nam nepriseu (Age-Old Sweetheart) & (Why Didn't You Come to Our House?) SATB a cap AP-1296
Good and Upright Is Our God SATB/organ AP-1323
Studena rosenka pada (Cold Dew Falls) SATB a cap AP-1268
Tancuj, tancuj, vykrucaj (Dance, Dance) SATB a cap AP-1270
The Eyes of All Wait SATB/Organ AP-1322
Three Czech Carols SSA a cap AP-1068
Zahucaly hory (Roaring Mountains) SATB a cap AP-1269
TWO INVOCATIONS - Solo Trombone & Organ AP-355 (UMP-TP) (11:19) Commissioned by the Czech Music Alliance. |
EJ, LASKO, LASKO: Folksongs from Bohemia, Moravia and Slovakia. Classical Guitar stylings by Eckels with Soprano Anita Smisek AP-005 Cassette $10. AP-006 Compact Disk $15. AP-1018 Songbook $ 3. 
Magdalena Ezoe, OP, (b March 27, 1931), a native of Tokyo, Japan, is an associate Professor of Music at Siena Heights University, Adrian, Michigan. A graduate of Siena, she holds a Master of Music degree from the Universityof Michigan.