Felix Labunski

Polish-born French and later American composer Felix Labunski’s birth name was Feliks Łabuński. His mother was a pianist and he had a brother Wiktor who also later immigrated to the United States. Both sons showed an early interest in music, and together spent many hours playing four-hand piano music. Felix graduated from a private high school in Moskva in 1910, but received no formal training in music theory or composition. In 1911, he studied architecture at the St. Petersburg Polytechnic Institute. He remained at the school for five years, producing songs, piano pieces, and chamber works when not occupied with mathematical problems and architectural designs.

At the time of the 1932 Olympic Games Labunski was living in Paris, participating for France in the Art Competitions in the category Music. He composed his “Olympic Hymn” (for male choir and orchestra) in 1932. In 1934 he returned to Paris and two years later emigrated to the United States. He then lectured over the CBS and NBC radio networks, gave piano recitals featuring his own works, and wrote articles and reviews for Musical America, Modern Music, Musical Courier, and various French and Polish periodicals.

In 1940-41 Labunski taught composition, counterpoint, and musical analysis at Marymount College in Tarrytown, New York, and he became an American citizen in 1941. After World War II he taught classes in composition, form analysis, and orchestration at the College of Music in Cincinnati, Ohio. In 1933 Labunski married Dorothea Boit-Giersach, an American artist who later exhibited paintings and sculptures. Their son Edward also became a composer and writer, but died fairly young in a car accident in 1980.