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Leopold Antonin Kozeluch
June 26, 1747 - May 7, 1818
born in Velvary, Czech Republic, composed during the Classical period
Biography
Leopold Antonin Kozeluch was a well-known composer and music pedagogue in his time who produced many works involving piano, including concertos, chamber works and solo compositions. But his output also encompassed a substantial number of works for orchestra and for vocal/choral forces, as well as for the theater, though most of the scores for his operas and ballets have been lost. For about the last decade-and-a-half of his career, Kozeluch focused primarily on Court musical duties and the arrangement of folksongs of Welsh, Irish and Scottish origin.



Kozeluch was born Jan Antonín Kozeluch but, to avoid confusion with an older cousin, adopted ‘Leopold' as his given name, dropping ‘Jan' altogether. He studied music in his childhood in Velvary and later in Prague with a cousin and with composer Franz Xavier Dussek. But Kozeluch's primary educational activity at this time was the study of law. Beginning in 1771 however, Kozeluch, already a virtuoso pianist whose compositional focus would have seemed to augur a penchant for symphonies and piano music, scored his first successes in ballet and pantomimes. He soon abandoned plans for a law career while continuing to produce popular scores for the theater until 1778, when he relocated to Vienna.
Selected Discography