Biography
Fereydoon Farrokhzad (Persian: فریدون فرخزاد ) (October 7, 1936 - August 6, 1992) was an Iranian singer, actor, poet, TV and radio host, writer, and political opposition figure. He was the younger brother of the acclaimed Persian poet Forough Farrokhzad.
He was stabbed to death on 8th August 1992, at his home in Bonn, Germany, and was found three days later. The murder has been treated as a work of the Iranian government.
Fereydoon Farrokhzad was born in "Chahar Raheh Gomrok" (Gomrok Intersection), a neighborhood in Tehran, Iran. He was the second of seven children (Amir, Massoud, Mehrdad, Forough, Pouran, Gloria). After graduating from high school he went to Germany and Austria for his post-secondary education. He got his Ph.D. in political science from a university in Berlin. At a young age Farrokhzad had a passion for poetry and for singing. He turned that passion to reality in 1962 when he started writing poems in Germany, which were published in two German newspapers. In 1964 Farrokhzad published his collection of poems called "Fasleh Deegar" (Another Season). His book was critically acclaimed and was honored by many famous German poets. Five months after the release of "Fasleh Deegar" Farrokhzad received the Poetry Award of Berlin. For a couple years Farrokhzad was a member of the Munich Academy of Poetry. In 1966 he found his way to the Television and Radio of Munich. On Radio he had a comedy and music program which played middle eastern music including music from Iran. On TV he created and produced a show called خيابان های آلپ (Alpine Roads). In 1967 he returned to Iran and performed on successful radio and TV shows. His most successful and famous TV show was "Mikhakeh Noghrei" (Silver Carnation). The show was watched by millions of Iranians. On the show Farrokhzad introduced and discovered many famous Iranian artists including Sattar, Shohreh, Shahram Solati, Ebi, Morteza, Rouhi Savoji, Hamid Shabkhiz, Leila Forouhar, Saeed Mohammadi and many more.
Farrokhzad married twice and both marriages ended in failure. His first marriage took place in 1962, to a German woman named Ania Buchkowski, whom he met at Oxford. Like Farrokhzad, she had a passion for poetry and theater; it was after meeting her that Farrokhzad started writing poems. They divorced, but they had a son called Rostam. His second marriage, to an Iranian woman, also ended in divorce.
On August 6, 1992 Farrokhzad was stabbed 40 times with a knife at his home in Bonn, Germany. He was found three days later by his neighbor, his body lying in a pool of blood with his dog whimpering beside him. The murder has been treated as a work of the Iranian government intelligence service, because of Farrokhzad's anti-Islamic Republic remarks in his shows, which insulted Khomeini and other leaders of the Islamic Republic of Iran.
His songs are still played on Iranian TV and Radio shows outside of Iran. Many artists like Saeed Mohammadi and Shahram Shabpareh have done covers of his famous songs. He is responsible for the success of many Iranian artist that are famous today. Singer Ebi has said that he owes his success to Farrokhzad. He was known by his fans to be an educated patriot who spoke out against the Islamic Republic.
Artist descriptions on Last.fm are editable by everyone. Feel free to contribute!
All user-contributed text on this page is available under the Creative Commons Attribution-ShareAlike License; additional terms may apply.
