Description

BOHUŠ HERAN, BAPTIZED BOHUMIL VÁCLAV (ÚSTÍ NAD ORLICÍ, FEBRUARY 6, 1907 – PRAGUE, MAY 4, 1968)

 

 

 

 

He was one of the initiators of the Kocián violin competition and was also instrumental in organizing the first year of the cello competition for young talents in 1968, which bears his name. He died at the age of 61.

Heran’s mother, a skilled amateur pianist, gave him the basics of musical education. He soon began to learn to play the violin, first with Adolf Dlouhé, but mainly with the excellent local amateur musician Alois Sychra. At the age of nine, his cello lessons began with Jan Mazánek. Thanks to the fact that the famous cellist Hanuš Wihan had a summer apartment in nearby Brandýs nad Orlicí, Heran became his private pupil in 1919. Under his guidance, Heran improved so much that in 1920, as a thirteen-year-old, he was accepted to the Prague Conservatory, where he graduated from the high school department and master’s school by 1926, both degrees under Jan Burian. He wrote about it himself: “Compared to other classmates, I progressed so quickly that I surpassed David’s entire school in a record time of two months.” I continued to progress very quickly, so that by the end of the school year I covered the material of three grades and during the final exams I advanced straight to the fourth grade…However, this was only in those subjects in which I caught up with the fourth grade. Otherwise, I progressed with my original classmates…” He concluded his high school studies in 1925 by performing Saint-Saëns’ Concerto in D minor with the Czech Philharmonic, conducted by Václav Talich, who was then teaching at the conservatory and at the end of his studies at at the masters school, of which he had been a pupil since 1924, he played Dvořák’s Cello Concerto op. 104 again with the Czech Philharmonic, this time conducted by František Stupka. [6]Then, thanks to a scholarship from the French government, which he received as one of 20 young Czechoslovaks, he studied at the Paris National Conservatory (Conservatoire National de Musique) with Gérard Hekking in the years 1926-28. In the following two years, he was engaged as the first cellist of the city orchestra in Winterthur, Switzerland, while in the summer he worked as concertmaster of the Pupp Orchestra in Karlovy Vary. In 1930, he joined the then still small Radiojournal orchestra in the same capacity, which grew rapidly and from 1938 bore the name Symphony Orchestra of the Czechoslovak Radio. Heran stayed there until 1953, when he left to teach the cello at the Prague Conservatory and from 1962 until the end of his life he taught his field at the Janáček Academy of Performing Arts in Brno, where, in his later role as vice-rector of the school, he greatly contributed to the expansion of the concert application of the school’s students . In 1967, he founded the JAMU International Interpretation Courses; the first year of which took place in Luhačovice. He was one of the co-founders of the competition for young violinists in Ústí nad Orlicí, named after the local native Kocian, which has been held since 1959, and the competition for young cellists, which has been held there every two years since 1968. It bears his name in memory of Heran, who died four days before the start of her freshman year.

As a soloist and chamber player, he devoted himself to music from the Baroque to the present. After the Second World War, he undertook concert trips to Poland, twice to Hungary and in 1957 a two-month tour to China, where he performed with the violinist Ivan Kawaciuk and the pianist Otakar Vondrovic in a trio. He performed the cello compositions of JS Bach, L. van Beethoven and Czech composers of the 18th century. He premiered compositions by Emil Hlobil, Iša Krejčí, Klement Slavický, etc., some of which were dedicated to him. He also performed works by Josef Bohuslav Foerster, Bohuslav Martinů, Osvald Chlubna, Sláva Vorlová, Karel Hába, whose Cello Concerto he performed at the 13th International Festival of Contemporary Music in Prague in 1935, or Jan Kapr. His repertoire included works by contemporary foreign authors such as Arthur Honegger, Dario Milhaud, etc. In the years 1942–47 he was a member of the Prague Piano Quartet, then its successor, the Prague Trio, performing occasionally until 1950. As a second cellist, he collaborated with the Pražský and Ondříčkový quartets. He compiled several collections of instructive pieces for beginning cellists, and a four-part set of etudes for more advanced students, which were published in several editions. He edited and revised cello compositions by various authors for print. The city of Ústí nad Orlicí granted Heran honorary citizenship in 1967 and his bust was unveiled there in 1988.

 

 

TRACKLIST

 

 

J. S. Bach, Bohuš Heran – Suites For Violoncello Nos 1. And 2

Label: Supraphon – SUA 10870

Format:

Vinyl, LP, Mono

Country: Czechoslovakia

Released: 1967

Genre:  Classical

Style: Baroque

Suite In G Major No. 1 For Violoncello Solo BWV 1007

A1 Prelude

A2 Allemande

A3 Courante

A4 Sarabande

A5 Minuetto

A6 Gigue

Suite In G Major No. 2 For Violoncello Solo BWV 1008

B1 Prelude

B2 Allemande

B3 Courante

B4 Sarabande

B5 Minuetto

B6 Gigue

Composed By – Johann Sebastian Bach

Violoncello – Bohuš Heran

 

Robert Schumann – Prager Sinfonie-Orchester / Dr. Václav Smetáček, Bohuš Heran – Konzert Für Violoncello Und Orchester A-moll, Op. 129 (Concerto For Cello And Orchestra In A Minor, Op. 129)

Label: Supraphon –  LPM – 164

Format: Vinyl, LP

Genre:  Classical

Konzert Für Violoncello Und Orchester A-moll, Op. 129 (Concerto For Cello And Orchestra In A Minor, Op. 129)

Konzert Für Violoncello Und Orchester A-moll, Op. 129

Konzert Für Violoncello Und Orchester A-moll, Op. 129