Jeremiáš, Jaroslav (EN)

Jeremiáš Jaroslav, *14 August 1889 Písek, †16 January 1919 České Budějovice, Czech pianist, composer, son of Bohuslav. Initially, he studied at the music school in Písek, later at the conservatory in Prague: in 1906–09 with K. Stecker (organ, composition) and A. Mikš (piano), and in 1909–10 with V. Novák (composition). From 1910 to 1911, he taught at a music school in České Budějovice, in 1911–12, he led the opera company in Ljubljana and then settled in Prague. From 1914 to 1915, he led the Hlahol choir in České Budějovice and made several concert tours around Europe, mainly as an accompanist of his brother Otakar, K. Burian and Olga Valoušková; he returned from a tour of Yugoslavia (1918) seriously ill and died soon thereafter.

Despite his premature death, Jaroslav Jeremiáš became known as an interesting writer and original music critic (an analysis of Wagner’s opera Tristan und Isolde, 1913, a polemical study on Janáček’s Jenufa and the works of Smetana, 1916) and a talented composer. The tendency to monumentalise the means of artistic expression is evidenced by his oratorio Mistr Jan Hus (composed for the 500^th anniversary of Hus’ death) and the opera Starý král.

Literature: B. Bĕlohlávek Jaroslav Jeremiáš. Doba, žíwot, dílo, Prague 1935; J. Plavec Jaroslav Jeremiáš. České umĕni dramatické, part 2, Prague 1941.