Jean Kurt Forest

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Werner Renner, Jean Kurt Forest and Willi Hera June 7, 1960

Jean Kurt Forest (born April 2, 1909 in Darmstadt , † March 3, 1975 in East Berlin ) was a German composer and musician.

Life

The son of an upholsterer learned to play the violin at the age of four, and as a six-year-old he received a thorough and varied training at the Spangenberg Conservatory in Wiesbaden . Until 1925 Forest studied violin, viola, singing, piano, trumpet, timpani and harmony there. He began in 1926 as concertmaster of the UFA Orchestra in Wiesbaden before taking on the same role at the Alhambra in Berlin from 1927 to 1929 , where he worked with Paul Dessau . From 1934 to 1936 Forest worked as principal violist with the Frankfurter Rundfunk-Symphonie-Orchester and in the Philharmonic State Orchestra of the Hamburg State Opera . In 1937 he was expelled from all positions by the Nazis for his anti-fascist stance and moved to Paris , but was expelled to Germany in 1938. Forest initially worked at the Stadttheater Neisse, before he became Kapellmeister at the Staatstheater Braunschweig in 1939 . From 1940 to 1942 he worked in smaller engagements.

In 1942 Forest was drafted into a labor unit of the Wehrmacht during World War II , but in 1945 defected to the Red Army . He attended an Antifa school and headed the Antifa music and artistry group . In 1948 Forest returned home from captivity . He became a member of the SED and took part in various functions in building up musical life in the GDR , initially as a choral music consultant on the Berlin radio , from 1948 to 1951 as the conductor of the Berlin radio and finally from 1952 as chief conductor of the German television radio . From the end of 1954 he was a freelance composer.

In 1951 Forest was one of the founding members of the Association of German Composers and Musicologists (VDK) and was chairman of the Berlin District Association from 1967 to 1971. In 1970 he was elected to the German Academy of the Arts (DAK). From 1969 until his death in 1975 he directed the Musica Nova chamber ensemble . He was buried in the south-west cemetery in Stahnsdorf .

Works

Especially in his final years, Forest, who came from the song and " mass song", turned to larger compositional forms. With orchestral works of smaller and larger sizes, with choirs and cantatas , he struggled to find a topic connected with the “new life”. His style was marked by austere folklore and illustrative clout. In 1954 he wrote “Spartacus, a symphonic portrait”, at the Buchenwald concert in 1958 his “Thuringian Concerto for French Horn and Orchestra” was performed. His opera “Der arme Konrad”, composed between 1955 and 1957, based on a play by Friedrich Wolf, was followed in 1960 by a second work, the chamber opera “Tai Yang awakens”, also based on Wolf. In the 1960s, Forest was also active as a film music composer , for example in the film Credo: Martin Luther - Wittenberg 1517 or in If you stick to me .

Filmography

Honors

literature

Web links
personal data
SURNAME Forest, Jean Kurt
ALTERNATIVE NAMES Forst, Kurt Jean (maiden name)
BRIEF DESCRIPTION German composer and musician
DATE OF BIRTH April 2, 1909
PLACE OF BIRTH Darmstadt , German Empire
DATE OF DEATH March 3, 1975
Place of death East Berlin , GDR