Mārtiņš Brauns

Mārtiņš Brauns (17 September 1951 – 24 November 2021) was a Latvian composer and musician. He composed multiple pieces, most notable of which is Saule, Pērkons, Daugava, a choir song regularly performed at the Latvian Song and Dance Festival. Career Brauns studied at the Emīls Dārziņš Music School from 1958 to 1970, studying piano and choir, before moving on to study conducting and music theory after his voice started changing. From 1975 to 1986, he led the rock band . In addition to film scores, Brauns wrote and composed multiple pieces for various theatre plays. His most famous piece, written in the late 1980s for the Valmiera Drama Theatre, titled Saule, Pērkons, Daugava, of which the lyrics are based on the poem Daugava by Latvian poet Rainis; this song has been performed regularly at the Latvian Song and Dance Festival since 1990, and is even considered the unofficial anthem of the festival. In 2014, an adapted version of the song with lyrics by Catalan poet Miquel Martí i Pol became the official anthem of the Catalan independence movement. Death Brauns was recovering from a heart attack at a hospital when he contracted COVID-19. He died on 24 November 2021, at the age of 70.