Bozidar Kantuser (1921–1999)

Born in Slovenia, American citizen, the composer Bozidar Kantuser lived, worked and died in Paris.

Freed of arbitrary academical rules, he formed his own technique and his own syntax and expressed his ideas and feelings in an original idiom, dominated by refinement and inventiveness of his intense poetry, of his abstract lyricism with some dramatic accents.

Bozidar Kantuser left four symphonies, concertos for solo instruments and orchestra, six string quartets, vocal compositions, works for organ, flute, horn, double-bass, percussions, piano.

He founded in 1968 in Fontainebleau the BIMC (Bibliothèque internationale de musique contemporaine). Later transferred to Paris, this contemporary music library became one of the most important in the world (over 20000 published scores and manuscripts by composers from all continents). Bequeathed to the Conservatoire supérieur de Paris, Kantuser’s Library became “Centre international d’information de musique contemporaine”.

His works for orchestra were premiered by conductors Jean-Jacques Werner, Roger Delage, his Concerto for flute — by Roger Bourdin. The organist Georges Delvallée premiered his “Méditation sur le Psaume XIII” in Lille in 1974. Voya Toncitch premiered his remarkable “Lettres à ma femme” (the painter Grace Renzi) in Richmond, Virginia on March 25th, 1979 and played the next day at Virginia Commonwealth University his “Trois pièces dodécaphoniques”. The same year, Toncitch recorded “Lettres à ma femme” for Radio France in Paris.

Jean-François Grancher