A famous composer, conductor, piano virtuoso, teacher, and founder of Czech national opera, he was born to Barbora and František Smetana in the castle brewery in Litomyšl on March 2, 1824. František had been leasing the brewery from the Valdštejns, which is why the family was living in the brewery’s staff apartment.

From 1829 until 1831, young Bedřich went to the local Piarist school. He had been around music since early childhood. His father, František, was himself an enthusiastic musician and a member of an amateur quartet. He acquired a violin for his son and had someone teach him to play the piano. Six-year-old Bedřich performed for the first time as a pianist on October 4, 1830 at a musical performance given by Litomyšl’s philosophy students. He was later invited by the Valdštejns to give concerts at the castle. Bedřich’s first attempts at composing also came from this period. In 1831, the Smetanas moved to Jindřichův Hradec, where the composer’s father rented the local brewery.

When Bedřich finished his secondary school studies, he resisted his father’s ambition for him to become a civil servant and conclusively decided to become a professional musician. In 1856, he left for Gothenburg in Sweden, where he worked as a music teacher and the director of a local music society. In 1861, he returned to Prague, taught music there, and became the Provisional Theater’s principal opera conductor. He gave up this position only in 1874 on account of an illness that caused him to become completely deaf. In the summer of 1876, he left for his daughter Žofie’s home in Jabkenice. Deafness did not impair his creative abilities. As he was no longer burdened by work obligations, he devoted himself intensively to composing. Nearly one third of his life’s work was created in Jabkenice, including many important pieces.

Bedřich Smetana died in Prague on May 12, 1884.