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Jazzbo

The perilous life and times of Čestmír Huňát

By Darrell Jónsson
For The Prague Post
November 14th, 2007 issue

KURT VINION/THE PRAGUE POST
Huňát in the reading room of Unijazz, an alternative arts organization banned by the communists that is celebrating its 20th anniversary this month.
COURTESY PHOTO
Jiří Stivín leads an experimental piece sponsored by the Jazz Section at Lucerna.
Unijazz

Jindřišská 5
Prague 1–New Town
Tel: 222 240 901
Web: www.unijazz.cz

The offices of Unijazz are just off Wenceslas Square, tucked away in a fourth-floor location reached through a grimy passageway with a laundromat and lackluster hotel. It’s a perfect location for an organization that wants to maintain low-key yet accessible headquarters.
More of a reading room than an office, Unijazz has a café and couches in what looks like a modified living room where people sip coffee, spin discs and read from the stacks of music fanzines that line the room.
At one of the tables, Čestmír Huňát, an unassuming middle-aged man in a perennial sportsman’s vest, spreads a stack of magazines and fanzines across the table. He is quick to indicate the police evidence numbers written on the upper right-hand corner of many of them. Looking at the magazines and then back at Huňát, who looks like a bookish music fan returning from a fishing trip, it’s hard to imagine any of this being a threat to a modern state.
Yet Huňát did six months of hard time in 1986 for his involvement in what would have been an innocent fan club in other parts of the world. Which didn’t stop him. On probation in 1987, he rejoined his friends in the Jazz Section, continuing to navigate the treacherous communist legal waters in pursuit of the music they wanted to hear. In 1987, Jazz Section morphed into Unijazz, which after the revolution became an established part of the cultural scene in Prague. It now sponsors CD listening sessions, lectures and publications along with several major annual music events, including Alternativa, Boskovice and Babí léto. With the organization celebrating its 20th anniversary this month, The Prague Post sat down with Huňát to talk about its history and accomplishments.
The Prague Post: What were the origins of Jazz Section and when did you join?
Čestmír Huňát: Jazz Section was established in 1971. There were problems with both hearing and playing music, especially with jazz and rock. I met the people in Jazz Section in 1975, and in 1976 I started to work with them. We were all volunteers.
TPP: Did you see music as a point of resistance?
CH: I was looking for music that I couldn’t hear on the radio or TV. When I was introduced to the Jazz Section, of course I felt this is something that the regime would not especially like. For example, at that time we could hardly ever hear songs on the local radio with English lyrics, and the regime pop stars profited considerably from these restrictions.
Over time, the pressure became stronger and stronger. We were prohibited from organizing concerts; apparently the state thought it was dangerous to their agenda when we would simply get a group of people to listen to some music.
TPP: And you were arrested for this?
CH: In 1980, after the prohibition was placed on Prague Jazz Days, from time to time we would make small concerts, but not under name or auspices of Jazz Section. Then we started to work more in printed materials, until 1986, when early in the morning Sept. 2, they came to our homes and we were searched, interrogated and arrested. I said goodbye to my wife and children, not knowing how long I would be gone. It was six months. The public statements presented at the time said we were arrested for economic reasons. They said we were running an unauthorized enterprise by publishing our fanzines and magazines.
TPP: Did things change at all, given the national and international publicity surrounding the arrests?
CH: I think the arrests had some influence on the culture of our country, because the officials had to show the world it wasn’t a political process. So from then on, there were possibilities to play rock music. For example, at the Congress Center in 1986, there was a rock festival.
Jazz Section became more well-known because of the trial. At first, people were bewildered in Western countries, hearing that there could be people in prison because of jazz music. Then momentum built with the international networks formed around Charter 77.
TPP: And for you personally?
CH: For me, after six months in jail and facing three years’ probation, it was not very comfortable to operate. We all had families, and the slightest misdemeanor would send us back to jail. But, after we were released in 1987, we began to think how we could continue. We were looking for a way that was suitable for our musical interests and ways of thinking, but would also fit in the frame of the state, because we had no passports to go elsewhere. It was clear we could not continue as the Jazz Section, so we found the name Unijazz.
TPP: Why that name?
CH: For us, Unijazz was not only a name to reflect music, but also about a lifestyle and point of view open to other influences. The word also means that everybody is important, with each individual responsible for doing their part.
The “jazz” part was important because we were members of the International Jazz Federation, which at that time was presided over by Sir Charles Alexander of Great Britain. And they supported us, giving us international visibility while providing our only legal protection.
TPP: Looking through copies of Unijazz’s fanzines over the past few years, there are articles about subjects like American Indian lore and 20th-century architecture.
CH: Well, that is part of the “Uni” aspect; we don’t like living in an aquarium. In Jazz Section, we started wondering what was happening in other fields of our society besides music, and were very interested and surprised how unique points of view were applied to other artistic and cultural endeavors. We also felt at times that there was a deficit of knowledge about the roots and context of jazz in the frame of music, and music in the frame of culture.
TPP: How has your direction changed since 1989?
CH: Many things have changed. In the ’80s, there was the pressure of the regime, and this pushed people together. After 1989, there was a big boom, with many interesting projects and activities. Some of these things continued and some of them did not, but much experience was gained in all of it. Nowadays, there is much more cooperation among people in the cultural fields than there was in the early ’90s. We have a good flow of information and exchange of know-how. This is not a very common atmosphere in the realm of entertainment, culture or show business.

Darrell Jónsson can be reached at tempo@praguepost.com


Other articles in Tempo (14/11/2007):

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