Hans Krása

Czech composer Hans Krása was born in Prague on 30 November 1899. Following early piano and violin lessons, he studied composition at the German Music Academy in Prague and then worked as a répétiteur at the Neues Deutches Theater, where he was influenced by Alexander Zemlinsky.

His opera Verlobung im Traum, after Dostoyevsky, was awarded the Czechoslovak State Prize.

On 10 August 1942 he was arrested as a Jew and an anti-fascist by the Nazis and sent to the Terezín ghetto, where he was very productive musically. His children's opera Brundibár, based on Aristophanes, was performed fifty-five times there, and also features in the propaganda film made for the International Red Cross in 1944.

He was deported to Auschwitz on 16 October 1944 along with Pavel Haas, Viktor Ullmann and Gideon Klein, and was killed there on approximately 17 October 1944.

A selection of articles about Hans Krása

CD Spotlight. Vividly Atmospheric - Music by composers in Theresienstadt, heard by Howard Smith. 'The Nash players' programme is presented with their customary aplomb ...'

Ensemble. Cruelly Written Out - Simon Broughton listens to works by Gideon Klein and Hans Krása