Emil František Burian (June 11, 1904 – August 9, 1959) was a Czech poet, journalist, singer, actor, musician, composer, dramatic adviser, playwright and director. E. F. Burian was a member of Devětsil, an association of Czech avant-garde artists. In 1926–1927, he worked with Osvobozené divadlo, but after disputes with Jindřich Honzl, he and Jiří Frejka left the theatre. Later, they founded their own theatre, Da-Da. He also worked with the Moderní studio theatre scene. In 1927 he founded the musical and elocutionary ensemble Voiceband. His work was strongly influenced by dadaism, futurism and poetism, and was very leftist oriented. After the war, it was strongly agitative of Communist ideas. He had a strong influence on Czech modern theatre, and his innovative staging methods (work with metaphor, poetry, and symbols) and inventions (theatergraph, voiceband) are inspirational for the theatre even now. Read more on Last.fm. User-contributed text is available under the Creative Commons By-SA License; additional terms may apply.