STHLM Blue Tide – A Tribute to Gunnar Bucht

In STHLM Blue Tide, we welcome what defies fixed categories – music and musicians that do not lend themselves easily to classification. This concert also forms part of the Svensk Musikvår festival.

Gunnar Bucht’s career is, in many ways, without parallel. After piano studies and an early debut as a pianist, he went on to study musicology in Uppsala, where he completed a doctoral thesis on the music of the Bridgettine Order. At the same time, he studied composition with Karl-Birger Blomdahl and Sven-Eric Bäck, and abroad with Max Deutsch and Carl Orff.

He has described his relationship to tradition as dialogic, where tradition is a challenge rather than a comfort – something reflected in his dual roles as composer and musicologist. “Historical and analytical perspectives are always present in my creative work,” he has said.

Bucht’s output is extensive, with a particular focus on orchestral music, including seventeen symphonies, but also chamber music, piano works, choral music and stage works. He describes his music as dramatic, shaped by the tension between emotionality and intellectuality.

Gunnar Bucht was Professor of Composition at the Royal College of Music in Stockholm from 1975 to 1985, where he taught a generation of composers including Anders Hillborg, Karin Rehnqvist and Jan Sandström. From 1987, he also served as the college’s rector for ten years. He has written a number of books, including the essay collections Pythagoras’ String and On Ugliness in Music, as well as the autobiography Born on the Warpath. Alongside his artistic work, he has held several important positions, including Chair of the Fylkingen society and the Swedish Society of Composers, and Swedish cultural attaché in Bonn.

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Come early, stay late – the bar will be open before and after the concert with drinks and appetizers.

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