Musician and writer Vratislav Brabenec will prematurely celebrate his 80th birthday with the christening of a poetry collection called Cestou na Bořeň, which will take place this Tuesday in the Prague cafe U Božího mlýn. The anniversary of the artist known from the band The Plastic People of the Universe falls on Friday.
The collection is published by the Maťa publishing house. In addition to poetry, it contains commemorative and jubilee texts by musician Eva Turnová, writer Jáchym Topol or former dissident František Stárek Čuňas, as well as a selected bibliography of Brabenac’s literary works. “I have hundreds of things written down, but due to the problems with my deteriorating eyesight, I will probably leave it here,” says Brabenec.
An uneducated theologian, gardener, chartist and artist declared some time ago that “the Lord made everything wrong, except women”. According to him, his love for women does not leave him even in advanced age. “I like to be outside watching the trees and girls bloom,” he states. He also has a positive relationship with alcohol. “When I have my eighth rum, friends tell me to stop. But I’m just starting to like it,” he declares.
Vratislav Brabenec in 2020 at the TrutnOFF BrnoON festival. | Photo: Patrik Uhlíř / Mafra / Profimedia
Brabenec is better known as a musician, but he has been devoted to literature for a long time. A collection of his poetry from the 1960s was already published in the samizdat magazine Vokno. He is the author of fairy tales Everywhere is the center of the world, collections of poems Sebedudy, Vůl Hvězda Ránní, Dear Mr. K. or prose Karlín – port. “He has the ability to create poetry from practically anything. His personal observations are carried in the pure-blooded Hrabal tradition, studded with small literary gems. However, it is not kitsch poetics of beer foam,” wrote the weekly Respekt, according to which Brabenec, like Hrabal, “simply combines an above-standard intellect with lived experience a person who spent most of his time involuntarily in an environment in which he had to excel with his erudition”.
At the turn of the 1950s and 1960s, Brabenec graduated from the agricultural technical school in Mělník with a degree in horticulture. He then studied at the Comenius Evangelical Faculty of Theology in Prague, which he did not finish. In the 1970s he was imprisoned by the communist regime, after his release he signed Charter 77, until in 1982 the State Security forced him to emigrate from Czechoslovakia to Canada, where he made a living as a landscape architect.
In 1997, after returning to the Czech Republic, Brabenec took part in the reunion of Plastic People in the Spanish Hall of Prague Castle on the occasion of the 20th anniversary of the publication of Charter 77. Brabenec is the main author of many of the group’s texts, which influenced Czech culture and public life. He was particularly involved in the albums What does it mean to lead a horse and Mask behind a mask or editing texts from the Old and New Testaments for the Easter Passion Play program.
Brabenac’s musical activity was dampened by the contradictions between the aforementioned Plastics, which in 2016 led to the creation of two groups of musicians claiming the name The Plastic People of the Universe. Brabenec worked in one for several years, but eventually decided to stop playing. According to his own words, he felt exhausted and playing the same songs over and over again felt uncreative.
The atmosphere of their last concert two years ago in the premises of the Broumov monastery is brought to a new level by Břetislav Rychlík’s half-hour documentary entitled Life is only God’s Mill. This Wednesday, April 26 evening, it will be broadcast by the station CT art.
“When, at the end of the last concert, the timpani of the Brno Philharmonic strike the end of the composition, the camera observes the faces of Josef Janíček and Vráti Brabenec. There is a stiff and disbelieving sadness in them. The most essential part of their lives is ending,” describes director Rychlík. “These are moments so raw and alive that they raise this modest half-hour film to another level. It is a look into the souls of two legends of the Czech underground,” he adds. Eight years ago, Brabenec was already the subject of a documentary film directed by Miroslav Janek called Evangelium podle Brabenec, which was based on a book of the same name with interviews with journalist Renata Kalenska.
On the occasion of the current jubilee, the saxophonist also released an album with jazz musicians called Nejsem na to usedy, on which the double bass player Petr Tichý or the violinist and pianist Anna Romanovská perform. They recorded it in January in the bassist’s home rehearsal room, where they devoted themselves to free improvisation.
“I’m close to free jazz. I used to do swing and old music, and I just always have free jazz and I enjoy it,” says Brabenec. “Some things are good, no one knows, every time it’s different, sometimes it works out, it’s hard. Like sex: sometimes it’s such an obligation and sometimes it sparks. But like everything, it’s about everything,” adds o a record released by Guerilla Records and intended for “more experienced listeners”.
The 80th anniversary of Vratislav Brabence will be commemorated this Friday, April 28, by events in Prague’s Kasárna Karlín, where the Pilsen big-beat trio Burgtheater, who have been putting Brabenc’s texts to music for a long time, and the band Eturnity, whose members include bassist Eva Turnová and keyboardist Michal Nejtek, will play. According to the organizers, Vratislav Brabenec himself could perform as part of the evening.
