Jiří Kopecký: Leoš Janáček - Dramaturgy of his operas
Leoš Janáček (1854–1928) did not start to deal with opera as a critic until the 1880s. As an opera composer, he did not gain a distinctive profile until the beginning of the 20th century, and he did not become completely confident in opera composition until after 1918. Janáček had considerable difficulty finding his unique way to the dramaturgy of opera. To this day, his operas still cause some complications for many listeners and at the same time are extraordinarily fascinating. An insight into Janáček's operas will try to explain his original compositional methods (e.g. his work with "time compressions", "speech melodies"), his typical solutions of key scenes (e.g. the slow cathartic waltz, the "monologue-dialogue" principle, the veristic arioso) and, last but not least, his unexpected rethinking of operatic conventions (a folk comic opera – naturalistic tragedy, historical grand opera – burlesque, etc.).
Jiří Kopecký studied Musicology at Palacký University in Olomouc (Mgr., 2002). He pursued his doctoral studies at the Philosophical Faculty of Masaryk University in Brno (Ph.D., 2002). Since 2005 he has been lecturing at the Department of Musicology of Palacký University. His main research interests include the history of musical culture in the Czech lands and the history of music theatre, especially 19th-century opera. On the basis of his dissertation he published the monograph Opery Zdeňka Fibicha z devadesátých let 19. století (“Zdeněk Fibich’s Operas from the 1890s”, 2008). He completed his habilitation in 2013 with the thesis Německá operní scéna v Olomouci 1770–1878 (“The German Opera Stage in Olomouc 1770–1878”, 2012; English translation 2015, German translation 2017). In collaboration with Lenka Křupková, Kopecký published the book Czech Music around 1900 (2017).
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