Interviews
An interview between Kateřina Bajo, the main coordinator for the membership of Prague as a city of literature in the UNESCO Creative Cities Network and David Dittrich, main coordinator for the membership of Brno as a city of music in the same network. The UNESCO Creative Cities Network was set up in 2004 and its main aim is to support cooperation and international cooperation and creativity. Now it brings together 180 member cities from 72 countries from around the world. The cities fall into 7 creative areas – literature, music, design, film, gastronomy, traditional crafts and media. A city applying for membership in the network has to fulfil very strict criteria, and it must be supported not only by the commission of experts but also by all the member cities. more
As part of the tour which has been in progress since the spring, on 28 November the group Zrní (which translates as Grain) will be coming to Fléda in Brno. They are performing their latest album called Jiskřící (Sparkling). The members of the group (four Honzas and one Ondra) reacted to our questions collectively, with only the responses of Honza Unger as the author of the lyrics sometimes coming to the forefront. more
As part of the Moravia Music Fest on 16 November the group Organic Quartet with Ondřej Pivec will be performing in Brno’s Metro Music Bar. This organist of Czech origin, who has lived in New York since 2009, has in recent years worked with the major signer Gregory Porter, and for his work on his album Take Me To The Alley even won a Grammy. In Brno he is presenting his new album Terms And Conditions Apply, which he recorded with his former Czech fellow players – the guitarist Libor Šmoldas, the drummer Tomáš Hobzek and the saxophonist Jakub Doležal. more
The Black Uganda Choir, a non-traditional polyphonic choir, is celebrating its 25th anniversary. Although the ensemble is led by Tomáš Drtílek, our questions were answered by the spokesman of the thirteen-strong ensemble, Ivan Holas, and the most productive writer in the group, Richard Lank. more
From 16 September to 19 December the twelfth year of Jazz Brno will be taking place in the Stará Pekárna club in Brno. It will offer not only modern jazz but also fusion, funk and a solid chunk of blues. The festival opens on Saturday 16 September with a concert by the American blues musician Linwood Taylor, who will be performing in Brno as part of a larger Czech tour. We asked him a number of questions on the telephone. more
Last year the jazz double bass player Vincenc Kummer celebrated his 75th birthday. On that occasion he wrote a book in which he described his artistic and personal life. more
At Folk Holidays 2017 in Náměšt nad Oslavou two significant groups from Denmark are appearing, among others. On Monday July 24 it will be the instrumental ensemble Dreamers’ Circus and on Thursday 27 July the quartet Nordens Tone. This is made up of three jazz musicians (piano, double bass and saxophone) and the singer Jullie Hjetland, who sings in eight different Nordic languages. And it was with her that we spoke by telephone. more
The brilliant Moravian cimbalom player Dalibor Štrunc (1966) came from a folk environment in Wallachia and after graduating from the Brno Conservatory had a number of musical engagements – from classical through folk to being a member for many years of Hana and Petr Ulrych’s group Javory. It is an unbelievable twenty-five years since he formed the group Cimbal Classic, in which he began to make use of his song-writing as well as musical skills. In that time Cimbal Classic has become a fixture on our folk scene. This year they are celebrating their anniversary with a new CD and a tour. more
We spoke with the trumpeter, arranger and bandmaster of the Brno big band B-Side Band on the occasion of the 10th birthday of this remarkable orchestra. Among other things the B-Side Band celebrated this anniversary with three concerts in Brno’s Sono Centre. more
Antonín Fajt is the son of the singer and violin player Iva Bittová and the drummer Pavel Fajt. Even if he does appear as a guest on the latest album At Home by Iva Bittová & Čikori, it isn’t a case of nepotism. He came up with and perfected his playing and composing style himself. He has had the chance to compare his childhood spent in Moravia with the last ten years spent overseas. And since he enjoys linking musical activity with for example the culinary arts or the healing effects of art, our interview was by no means just about music. more
When I polled Czech jazz musicians to find the most significant woman on the domestic scene, the largest number of votes went to the trumpet player, composer and conductor Štěpánka Balcarová and the pianist and composer Beata Hlavenková. In the JazzFest Brno festival both will be performing. The Concept Art Orchestra big band under Štěpánka Balcarová will be performing on Wednesday 5 April in the Theatre Husa na provázku and a day later the trumpet player will be playing in HaDivadlo with her Czech-Polish group Inner Spaces. On Thursday 13 April in Besední dům the will be a concert of Beata Hlavenková, focussing on her most recent album Scintilla. We conducted interviews with both young ladies. more
The singer Lenka Nová was born in Brno. Even now she frequently and happily returns. Last autumn she released her third profile disk, Čtyřicítka (Forty), on which there are ten personal songs with texts by Michal Horáček. She was recently nominated for the Anděl music prize in the category Singer of the Year. This year with a newly rehearsed repertoire on March 8 and 9 in the bar U kouřícího králíka in her home town she opened her Čtyřicítka Tour, the spring part of which will be concluded with a Prague concert in the DVA studio on May 21. And we spoke about all of this … more
Soprano Maida Hundeling, who debuted, for example, at the Metropolitan Opera in New York last season, returned to the Janáček Opera after a year. The singer known from leading opera houses around the world will perform in Brno again in the role of Tosca in Puccini's opera of the same name. The production of the local artistic director Jiří Heřman already impressed during its premiere. The director based his concept on the connection between the story of the singer Tosca in the environment of the complicated political situation in the Roman Republic in 1800 and the story of one of its extraordinary performers in the second half of the last century – opera superstar Maria Callas. As the critics wrote, it is a theatrically impressive and inspiring interconnection between the fates of the two women, adored opera divas, who were in love in politically complicated times that swallowed them whole. Mainly Maida Hundeling excelled in the main roles of this Brno production. more
The Vilém Spilka Quartet included surprising material in their new album Podvod. The band, headed by the director and dramaturgist of the JazzFest Brno Festival, recorded instrumental jazz arrangements of songs Hejna včel, Tulácký ráno, Na kameni kámen, Stánky and other campfire hit songs by Jan Nedvěd. He had a chance to listen to the recording shortly after its completion and we spoke to Vilém Spilka about Nedvěd’s reaction. And the interview, of course, also covered Porta, sausages and a campfire pot. more
We talked with Jitka Šuranská about a new album full of music, where she is the bandleader, but as she points out herself, she is only one of three equal elements. The Jitka Šuranská Trio consists of her, cross-genre mandolinist Martin Krajíček and multi-instrumentalist (educated jazz bassist) Marian Friedl. The three musicians started the debut tour of the first album Divé husy symbolically on 1 October at the Goose Festival in Boskovice, two day later they launched it in the Stará Pekárna Club in Brno. Until mid-October, they will be touring clubs, cinemas and libraries in Náchod, Rožnov pod Radhoštěm, Zlín and České Budějovice. Although the trio mentions folk songs as their inspiration, their author's coat is made of many musical styles, yet it is harmonious and interesting. And Jitka's own musician's path is important and inspirational for the final outcome. more
Connection, unity, contemplation - these words can be used to describe the musical evening of Schola Gregoriana Pragensis under the direction of David Eben and organist Tomáš Thon, which took place yesterday as part of the Easter Festival of Sacred Music at the church of St. Thomas. Not only the singing of a Gregorian chant, but also the works of composer Petr Eben (1929-2007) enlivened the church space with sound and colour for an hour. more
With a concert called Ensemble Inégal: Yesterday at the church of St. John, Zelenka opened the 31st edition of the Easter Festival of Sacred Music, this time with the suffix Terroir. This slightly mysterious word, which is popularly used in connection with wine, comes from the Latin word for land or soil, and carries the sum of all the influences, especially the natural conditions of a particular location and on the plants grown there. This term is thus metonymically transferred to the programme of this year's VFDH, as it consists exclusively of works by Czech authors, thus complementing the ongoing Year of Czech Music. more
For the fourth subscription concert of the Philharmonic at Home series, which took place on 14 March at the Besední dům and was entitled Mozartiana, the Brno Philharmonic, this time under the direction of Czech-Japanese conductor Chuhei Iwasaki, chose four works from the 18th to 20th centuries. These works are dramaturgically linked either directly through their creation in the Classical period or by inspiration from musical practices typical of that period. The first half of the concert featured Martina Venc Matušínská with a solo flute. more
The second stop on the short Neues Klavier Trio Dresden's Czech-German tour was at the concert hall of the Janáček Academy of Music on 6 March at 16:00. A programme consisting of world premières by two Czech and two German composers was performed in four cities (Prague, Brno, Leipzig and Dresden). more
The last opera première of the National Theatre Brno this year was Hurvínek Sells the Bride, which was co-produced with the Spejbl and Hurvínek Theatre. The première continued the thematic focus associated with the Year of Czech Music and took place on 24 November in the large hall of the Reduta Theatre. more
With Thursday's concert entitled Bruckneriana, the Brno Philharmonic under the direction of Principal Conductor Dennis Russell Davies launched the subscription series Philharmonia in the Theatre I. The orchestra performed works by Anton Bruckner and Stanislaw Skrowaczewski, a Polish-American conductor and composer who devoted his life's work to Bruckner. Performers wearing crimson sashes with the inscription "Playing forte!” appeared in front of the audience, joining the "Let's not let culture die” initiative, which draws attention to the underfunding of culture and opposes the government's plan to invest just 0.64% of the state budget into culture next year, moving further and further away from its promise to spend at least 1%. more
The Brno Philharmonic Orchestra has been running the Orchestral Academy of the Brno Philharmonic (OAFB) project for nine seasons, enabling young talented musicians to gain orchestral experience in a professional ensemble. In this manner, the orchestra educates the next generation of musicians, both permanent and external. However, working here also gives young people the opportunity to show their skills in chamber music and in a concert series called Young Blood aka Music Up Close. The first seasonal concert took place on Wednesday 15 November at Besední dom. more
Baladas da Luta, Fighting Ballads, is the title of the sixth album by Brazilian singer Mariana Da Cruz and her Swiss-Brazilian band Da Cruz. It is a combination of modern music that combines Latin American tradition and contemporary electronic elements with strong lyrics. In them, the author fights for women’s rights, stands up against dictatorships and specifically criticizes the atmosphere that has evolved in Brazil under the now former authoritarian President Bolsonaro. Da Cruz performed at Brasil Fest Brno in August 2023. We revisit this festival with an interview conducted following their concert at Zelný trh. Singer Mariana Da Cruz and keyboard player and producer Ane Hebeisn, performing as Ane H, responded to our questions. more
The programme for Janáček Brno 2024, an international opera and music festival now in its 9th year, was unveiled at a concert held to mark this occasion entitled Janáček to the start! On Saturday, 4 November, the Mahen Theatre was filled not only with devoted fans of the festival, but also with foreign journalists, politicians and prominent figures from the world of culture. In addition to a collection of wonderful musical performances, the audience was also treated to a lineup of renowned artists – Kateřina Kněžíková (soprano), Václava Krejčí Housková (mezzo-soprano), Josef Špaček (violin) and, last but not least, Robert Kružík, who took on the role of both conductor leading the Orchestra of the Janáček Opera at the National Theatre Brno during the evening and also performing as a cellist. more
The musical comedy The Addams Family is the latest production to hit the stage of the Music Theatre of Brno City Theatre. Audiences are in for an ironic, slightly morbid and enticingly horrific spectacle for the whole family. A musical production has been crafted here which serves up a famous contemporary pop culture phenomenon, as well as a generous helping of hyperbole and catchy melodies to boot. And testament to the audience’s hunger for this wacky family is the fact that all thirty performances are already nearly sold out… more
The Ensemble Versus choir, accompanied by the Ensemble Opera Diversa under the baton of Gabriela Tardonová, demonstrated what a combination of historical and modern instruments sounds like within a contemporary musical context in the Red Church. The dramaturgical line of Tuesday evening was presented in the spirit of a combination of the works of Carlo Gesualdo da Venosa (1566-1613) and the world premiere of Exsultet by the principal composer Ondřej Kyas (*1979), which also includes parts written for cornett (Radovan Vašina), dulcian (Jan Klimeš), trombone (Pavel Novotný) and theorbo (Marek Kubát). more
The second New World of Moravian Autumn festival began on Thursday in Brno’s Besední dům. This project, by students of the Faculty of Music at the Janáček Academy of Performing Arts, was primarily originally created for the practical musical programming course and intended to be a one-off event during the Moravian Autumn the year before last. Subsequently, however, more students signed up and started working on a repeat festival. The dramaturgy for New World 2023 was handled by percussionists Adéla Spurná and David Paša, bassoonists Aneta Kubů and Josef Paik, and multimedia composer Martin Janda. Three concerts were prepared for 19, 20 and 21 October for this mini festival. more
The Restlessness of Icelandic Peace was the name of a concert on 15 October at the Cathedral of Saints Peter and Paul in Brno, at which conductor Chuhei Iwasaki with the Moravia Brass Band and American artist Adam Wiltzie performed a work by Icelandic composer Jóhann Jóhannsson (1969-2018). Many of you may know his music from the award-winning films The Theory of Everything and Arrival. more
The third concert of the Moravian Autumn Festival, held under the auspices of the Ambassadors of Latvia and Lithuania, Elita Kuzma and Laimonas Talat-Kelpša, presented mostly contemporary works by foreign composers on Wednesday 4 October at the Besední dům. The show was directed by the Kremerata Baltica string orchestra, who invited the young talented pianist Onutė Gražinytė to join them, and the whole evening primarily rode on a wave of minimalism. However, during the preparation of the concert, the programme was changed and instead of Geörgy Ligeti's String Quartet No.1 "Métamorphoses nocturnes", works by Jēkabs Jančevskis and Olli Mustonen were performed in their place. more
The Ensemble Opera Diversa has already presented several compositions by David Matthews (*1943) to Brno audiences, and in most cases these were Czech or even world premieres. This year Matthews’ 80th birthday was celebrated with a performance by the above-mentioned ensemble, or rather its chamber branch Diversa Quartet, headed by dramaturge Jiří Čevela, with a concert on 20 September at the Villa Löw-Beer. The programme, consisting of works by composers closely associated with David Matthews himself, including his own compositions, was preceded by an hour-long discussion in the presence of the composer. Matthews is a British-born composer with long-standing ties to the Brno circle of composers and musicologists. In addition to his participation in the so-called "apartment seminars" in the 1980s, he also is friends with several personalities such as composer, pedagogue and oboist Pavel Zemek Novák (*1957). more
Editorial
An Easter festival of sacred music: Local authors and many world premieres
Terroir, a term used especially in the wine industry, is the subheading of this year's 31st annual Easter Festival of Sacred Music. It refers to the set of natural conditions, especially soil properties, which give a crop its distinctive character. Terroir perfectly describes the dramaturgy of this year's edition, which is focused exclusively on the work of domestic composers in the Year of Czech Music. more
Culture Newsletter from the BCH Department of Culture, March 2024
The Brno Culture Newsletter brings you an overview of what is happening in theatres, clubs, festivals and cultural events in Brno. more
Musica Florea is preparing a concert entitled The Unknown Leoš Janáček and the Beginnings of Baroque
The Musica Florea ensemble is preparing a new concert programme to be performed for the first time this April. This year marks the 170th anniversary of Leoš Janáček's birth, and to mark the occasion the ensemble has taken up his earliest compositions to set them alongside works from the early Italian Baroque. Musica Florea will be performing with conductor Mark Štryncl. The soloists will be Barbora Kabátková, Stanislava Mihalcová, Daniela Čermáková, Hasan El Dunia and Jaromír Nosek. more
Easter concerts are already a tradition at the Brno City Theatre. This Easter, the Rock Mass will be performed on Friday and Saturday at the Music Stage of the Brno City Theatre. more
Year of Czech music with ProART: Smetana 200 and Ogoun 100
The ProART art group is celebrating 20 years of its activity. In addition to the celebrations, the Year of Czech Music also commemorates the anniversary of the composer Bedřich Smetana and the Czechoslovak choreographer Luboš Ogoun. These anniversaries will be combined into one production, DREAMS OF CONSCIOUSNESS. more
The Easter Festival starts on Sunday. Introducing the Tenebrae - three candlelit evenings
Tenebrae, has long been one of the most impressive parts of the Easter Festival of Sacred Music. They are held from Wednesday to Good Friday, always from 9 pm at the Jesuits'. This year, the darkened church, in which candles are burning, will be unusually filled with music commissioned by the festival. more
The festival enters its 17th year with a series of concerts that will fill not only the South Moravian metropolis with funky music, but also Prague as part of the "travelling" concerts. The year-long festival programme is starting to take off and the organisers are adding two more names. The previously announced French band Electro Deluxe is now joined by Fun Lovin' Criminals and the most prominent jazz-funk formation from Iceland - Mezzoforte. more
In between genres: Commemoration of the 100th anniversary of the start of radio broadcasting in Moravia
The concert entitled "In between genres" is the culmination of a three-day event celebrating 100 years of radio broadcasting in Moravia. The whole event includes genre-free concerts, a showcase of new music recordings from radio production and a colloquium dealing with folk songs in radio broadcasting, and last but not least, a commemoration of editor Jaromír Nečas and his radio venture - a series of programmes called The Colourful Singing World. The final concert is moderated by Břetislav Rychlík and Jiří Plocek. more
World renowned harpsichordist Mahan Esfahani will perform at Besední dům
Mahan Esfahani, an absolute world leader in harpsichord playing, is coming to Brno. He was the first and only harpsichordist in the world to win the BBC's New Generation Artist in 2008-2010 and has won countless prestigious music awards. He will perform with the Brno Philharmonic Orchestra in a programme entitled Mahan Esfahani: harpsichord in the main role. more
Concert within the Brno - Stuttgart partnership: Music for Friendship
Years of international cooperation between the cities of Brno and Stuttgart will culminate in one musical event - a joint concert in the Hall of the Brothers of Charity. Rossini's Petite Messe Solennelle will be performed by the Ökumenischer Choir. more
