Ferenc Erkel

Ferenc Erkel ( , ; November 7, 1810June 15, 1893) was a Hungarian composer. He was the father of Hungarian grand opera, written mainly on historical themes, which are still often performed in Hungary. He also composed the music of "Himnusz", the national anthem of Hungary, which was adopted in 1844.

Erkel was born in Gyula, a son of Joseph Erkel. The libretti of his first four operas were written by Béni Egressy. Beside his operas, for which he is best known, he wrote pieces for piano and chorus, and a majestic Festival Overture. He acquainted Hector Berlioz with the tune of the Rákóczi March, which Berlioz used in The Damnation of Faust.

He headed the Budapest Philharmonic Orchestra (founded in 1853). He was also the director and piano teacher of the Hungarian Academy of Music until 1886. The Hungarian State Opera House in Budapest was opened in 1884, of which he was the musical director.

In 1839, he married Adél Adler, and they had four sons - Gyula (July 4, 1842, PestMarch 22, 1909, Újpest), Elek (November 2, 1843, PestJune 10, 1893, Budapest), László (April 9, 1844, PestDecember 3, 1896, Bratislava) and Sándor (January 2, 1846, PestOctober 14, 1900, Békéscsaba) - who participated in the composing of his later operas.

Erkel was an internationally acknowledged chess player as well. He died in Budapest.

A department of the Opera House was established in 1911 in Budapest which also performs operas, named Erkel Színház (Erkel Theatre) since 1953.

The Biography appearing in this section is attributed to Wikipedia: http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Ferenc_Erkel. Portions of this Biography may be available under the Creative Commons Attribution-ShareAlike License, version 3.0 or any later version, available at: http://creativecommons.org/licenses/by-sa/3.0/. Additional terms may apply. See Wikipedia Terms of Use for details.