Jan Dismas Zelenka

Jan Dismas Zelenka (16 October 1679 – 23 December 1745) was a Czech composer and musician of the Baroque period. His music is admired for its harmonic inventiveness and mastery of counterpoint. Zelenka was raised in Central Bohemia, educated in Prague and Vienna, and spent his professional life in Dresden. The greatest success during his career was the performance of the extensive composition Sub olea pacis et palma virtutis in the presence of the Emperor Charles VI, shortly after his coronation as king of Bohemia in 1723. Life Early life Zelenka, baptised Jan Lukáš Zelenka, was born in Louňovice pod Blaníkem in Bohemia, a market town southeast of Prague. He was the eldest of eight children born to Marie Magdalena (née Hájek) and Jiří Zelenka. The middle name Dismas is probably his confirmation name. Zelenka’s father Jiří was a schoolmaster and organist in Louňovice, and was likely his first music teacher. Nothing more is known with certainty about Zelenka’s early years, except that he received his musical training at the Jesuit college Clementinum in Prague and that his instrument was the violone (bass viol). His earliest known work is the school drama Via laureta (ZWV 245), compo