Opera

News

Today, Culture Minister Martin Baxa announced the results of the selection process for the new General Director of the National Theatre and appointed Martin Glaser to the post. He is expected to start on 1 August 2028.  more

After more than 50 years, a new production of Puccini's Manon Lescaut returns to the Janáček Theatre as the opera directorial debut of Štěpán Pácl and with music conducted by Ondrej Olos.  more

The production team and soloists will appear in a pre-première preview of the new production of Puccini's opera Manon Lescaut. The preview will take place at the Janáček Theatre and can also be watched online.  more

The Janáček Opera of the National Theatre Brno is holding an audition for a second bass for its opera chorus. Full-time position.  more

The Leoš Janáček Foundation, the Society of Friends of the NdB and the JAMU Faculty of Music invite you to a discussion with singer and teacher Natalia Romanová. The event will take place in the Mozart Hall of the Reduta Theatre.  more

Peter Berger has been nominated for a Thalia Award for performing the role of Dalibor in the production of Smetana's opera Dalibor, directed by David Pountney and scored by Tomáš Hanus.  more

The Brno Culture Newsletter presents an overview of what is happening in the city’s theatres, clubs, summer festivals and other cultural events in Brno.  more

The twentieth annual Music Znojmo festival is subtitled "Music and Victory". For the first time in the festival's history, the organisers will present two operas in their own production, three annual concerts charting the history of the event, and a concert on the water or in a straw amphitheatre. The festival will also feature a performance of Juditha Triumphans, an oratorio unknown in the Czech Republic.  more

The Brno Culture Newsletter presents an overview of what is happening in the city’s theatres, clubs, summer festivals and other cultural events in Brno.  more

The opera season will culminate at the Janáček Theatre with the world première of Here I Am, Orlando based on the novel by Virginia Woolf. For this adaptation, the artistic director of the Janáček Opera and director Jiří Heřman reached out to the prominent Slovak composer Ľubica Čekovská. The future chief conductor of the Janáček Opera of the National Theatre Brno (NdB), Robert Kružík, will take on the musical direction, while the choral part will be staged by Martin Buchta.  more

Feature articles

Leoš Janáček's (1854-1928) Moravian national opera Jenůfa was brought to Brno for the Janáček Brno 2024 festival by the Moravian Theatre Olomouc in a co-production with the Janáček Opera NdB. Rather than using the Czech title Její pastorkyňa, the production team, headed by director Veronika Kos Loulová, decided to stage the work as Jenůfa, the name under which it is performed abroad. On Wednesday, 20 November, five days after its première in Olomouc, the audience at the Mahen Theatre could also see the latest domestic take on Janáček's most widely performed opera. The musical staging of the significantly modified original version from 1904 was the work of conductor Anna Novotná Pešková, and the main roles were played by Barbora Perná (Jenůfa), Eliška Gattringerová (Kostelnička), Josef Moravec (Laca Klemeň) and Roman Hasymau (Števa Buryja). 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

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

On 18 and 19 August, the tenth anniversary edition of the Olomouc Baroque Music Festival included a unique dramaturgical treat in its program – one of the most historically important Czech operas which, however, does not appear much on the stages of opera houses or music halls. This is Dráteník (The Tinker), the first original Czech opera composed by František Škroup to a libretto by Josef Krasoslav Chmelenský. It was directed by Kateřina Křivánková, with costumes and set by Sylva Marková and music by Marek Čermák, and performed by the Volantes Orchestra, the festival’s resident ensemble. Singing roles were taken up by Matúš Šimko (Dráteník/Škroup), Lenka Cafourková Ďuricová (Růžena), Vincenc Ignác Novotný (Vojtěch), Zuzana Badárová (Liduška), Aleš Janiga (Květenský), Jiří Miroslav Procházka (Lána), and Martin Vodrážka (Kůl). The purely dramatic roles of Chmelenský – the aforementioned author of the libretto – and Hranatý the guard were played by Martin Mihál. The reviewer visited the premiere performance.  more

For the sixth time, the Music Marathon has stirred up the streets, squares, and many spaces in Brno with all sorts of musical genres. These are not necessarily just concert venues, however. The Hausopera ensemble, for example, took their opera The Eternal Miss Pale to the Zeman Café on Friday 12 August. In three weekend performances there, they will complete their “Trilogy for the City”, a custom-made project for Brno that recalls its pros, cons, and above all some of its functionalist buildings.  more

Just like every year, the Znojmo Music Festival brought its visitors an opera of its own production. For this year's 18th edition, subtitled Returning Home and Our Guardian Angels, the organizers prepared a stage performance of Joseph Haydn's oratorio The Return of Tobias. The Old Testament story about a tested marriage and a blind father was performed by the Czech Ensemble Baroque under the baton of Roman Válek and directed by Tomáš Ondřej Pilař at the premiere on 15 July 2022 (this performance was visited by this author) in the riding hall of the Louka Monastery – the reprise and last performances will take place on the following two days. Shira Patchornik (Sarah), Lucie Kaňková (d'Azaria), Dagmar Šašková (Anna), Theodore Browne (Tobias), and Adam Plachetka (Tobit) performed the solo roles. Costumes were designed by Ivana Ševčíková Miklošková, choreography by Martin Šinták, and lighting design by Tomáš Příkrýmore

The work by the British composer Benjamin Britten forms an essential part of contemporary opera production. Worldwide, he is even the most frequently staged author born in the 20th century.  Peter Grimes, with a libretto by Montagu Slater based on a poem by George Crabbe, became the opera that set the course for Britten's next musical-dramatic works. And it is with the title Peter Grimes that the Brno National Theatre has opened the opera part of the 2021/2022 season. The story of a rough and tumble fisherman, whose two young apprentices die soon after each other and who as a result sails out to sea, where he sinks his boat and himself with it, had its Czechoslovak premiere in Brno in June 1947. Almost 75 years after, the story of a fishing village, resentment, cruelty and gossip is now coming to life again in the Janáček Theatre, directed by David Radok and with a musical score by Marko Ivanović. The title role was played by tenor Joachim Bäckström and the widowed teacher Ellen Orford, who found affection in Grimes, was portrayed by soprano Jana Šrejma Kačírková. This is not the first time that these two have met on stage together – it was with Mark Ivanović and David Radok that they had previously joined forces for the play Juliette / Lidský hlas (Juliette/The Human Voice). Jana Hrochová (Auntie), Andrea Široká (Niece), Tereza Kyzlinková (Niece), Svatopluk Sem (Balstrode), Jitka Sapara-Fischerová (Mrs. Nabob Sedley), Jan Št'áva (Swallow), Vít Nosek (Bob Boles), Petr Levíček (Horace Adams), David Nykl (Hobson), Jiří Hájek (Ned Keene) and Ivo Šiler (Dr. Crabbe) were also featured, along with the others.  more

Despite the unpredictability of the coronavirus situation, the Janáček Brno 2020 festival opened yesterday at the Janáček Theatre in Brno. The gala opening of the festival featured a premiere of the opera Destiny by Leoš Janáček directed by Robert Carsen, one of today's praised opera directors.  In fact, Brno audiences had the opportunity to get acquainted with his directing visions of Janáček's operas already in the past; Carsen's concepts for The Makropulos Affair and Katya Kabanova rank among the best that have appeared on the stage of the National Theatre in Brno in recent years. However, the production of Destiny at this year's Janáček's festival is even more exceptional, as this time the director created it directly for the Brno opera house. The costumes were designed by Annemarie Woods, while the stage design was created by Radu Boruzescu. Philip Sheffield (old Živný) and Enrico Casari (young Živný) played the roles of the composer Živný; his fateful love Míla Válková was portrayed by Alžběta Poláčková and her mother by Natascha Petrinsky. Peter Račko performed the role of Dr. Suda, Jan Šťáva was the painter Lhotský and Lukáš Bařák gave his voice to the character of Konečný. The music production is the work of Marko Ivanović, who also conducted the premiere yesterday.Destiny is often described as a problematic opera with a confused story and an imperfect libretto.  more

For the end of this summer, the National Theatre Brno prepared a children's opera, written by the composer Evžen Zámečník under the title Ferdy the Ant  (original Czech title: Ferda Mravenec), based on the story by Ondřej Sekora. The stories of an optimistic ant who "can do anything and knows everything" and doesn’t turn his nose up at “work of all kinds", however, are actually not appearing at the Janáček Theatre for first time. Zámečník's work in eight scenes won the hearts of the Brno audiences between the years 1977 and 1986 with astounding success; it helped bring a number of children to opera – the most refined form of musical theatre. Today, these already adult musicians, actors, directors, lighting technicians and many others have decided to pay tribute to the composer, who also carried out a lot of "work of all kinds" for Brno's musical life.  more

Cultural life has endeavoured to move into a sterile and "life-safe" social networking environment in an unequal struggle against the viral phantasm and government lockdown regulations. In the darkest months, music institutions competed with one another in staging recordings of memorable concerts, and major opera houses broadcast to the world those of their performances that gained the most success from spectators.  more


Mon Tue Wed Thu Fri Sat Sun
28 29 30 1 2 3 4
5 6 7 8 9 10 11
12 13 14 15 16 17 18
19 20 21 22 23 24 25
26 27 28 29 30 31 1
2 3 4 5 6 7 8

Mon Tue Wed Thu Fri Sat Sun
26 27 28 29 30 31 1
2 3 4 5 6 7 8
9 10 11 12 13 14 15
16 17 18 19 20 21 22
23 24 25 26 27 28 29
30 1 2 3 4 5 6

Mon Tue Wed Thu Fri Sat Sun
28 29 30 1 2 3 4
5 6 7 8 9 10 11
12 13 14 15 16 17 18
19 20 21 22 23 24 25
26 27 28 29 30 31 1
2 3 4 5 6 7 8

Mon Tue Wed Thu Fri Sat Sun
26 27 28 29 30 31 1
2 3 4 5 6 7 8
9 10 11 12 13 14 15
16 17 18 19 20 21 22
23 24 25 26 27 28 29
30 1 2 3 4 5 6

Mon Tue Wed Thu Fri Sat Sun
30 1 2 3 4 5 6
7 8 9 10 11 12 13
14 15 16 17 18 19 20
21 22 23 24 25 26 27
28 29 30 31 1 2 3
4 5 6 7 8 9 10
Upcoming events

Manon Lescaut

11/05/25, 18:00 / Janáčkovo divadlo (Janáček Theatre)

Love knows no bounds, guilt falls into oblivion, but my love will not die... The beautiful Manon is no stranger to any weakness - she wanted the love of the young knight Des Grieux and a life of luxury and wealth that only the old banker Géront can provide... But everything has its price and not even love can save everything. “Manon is a heroine I believe in, and that's why you can't help but win the hearts of the audience. Why couldn't there be two operas about Manon? A woman like Manon can have more than one lover. Massenet feels her like a Frenchman, with powder and minuets. I will feel it like an Italian, with a desperate passion," declared Puccini determinedly, when his publisher tried to talk him out of composing an opera on a theme that had already been set to music. And he did well, because Manon Lescaut has been one of his great successes since its premiere in Turin in 1893. He kept what he promised and offered his audience passion, despair and hope that overcomes even the tragic end of the main characters. After all, love never dies.

Veselá vdova

13/05/25, 19:00 / Janáčkovo divadlo (Janáček Theatre)

The idea for The Merry Widow was found by librettist Leo Stein in the form of a French comedy, which he discovered by chance while rummaging through the library on a visit. The originally intended composer was not interested and the choice fell on the young Franz Lehár. If it was an intervention of fate, then he turned out to be very lucky. Lehár, with a Hungarian mother and a Moravian father, apparently had a flair for melodies, swing and wit thanks to his mixed family heritage. The Merry Widow's number is every little musical gift, and melodies like U Maxima jsem znam, the song about Vilije, Women, women and others quickly became famous. Lehár also became famous thanks to The Merry Widow, and today his operetta is also in the repertoire of the New York MET. The Merry Widow is returning to the Brno stage after almost thirty years, and an already experienced team will take over. Director Magdalena Švecová, together with choreographer Martin Pack and artists Zuzana Přidalová and David Janošek, are the authors of the great and rich productions of Ferda Mravenc and La bohème. So you can look forward to the charm of Paris at the turn of the century with more pageantry.

Carmen

14/05/25, 19:00 / Janáčkovo divadlo (Janáček Theatre)

French esprit and Spanish passion are hidden in the music of Bizet's Carmen. Finally, who does not know the immortal opera hits - the famous Habanera or the aria of the toreador Escamillo. But what if there is something more hidden behind the story of love's flightiness?

How is an opera made? Workshop for the second grade of primary and secondary schools

16/05/25, 9:00 / Janáčkovo divadlo (Janáček Theatre)

Where did opera originate? What is a libretto? Who is the inspector? And what does a scenographer need to know? You will learn this and much more at our workshop. Participants will learn about the opera genre, the production process, the operation of the theater and the professions that work in the theater. It also includes a taste of opera singing. The participants will be offered several connected activities, which should give them the opportunity to look under the hood of the functioning of the opera theater, the opera genre and its demands. The workshop also includes a short tour of the Janáček Theater.

Její pastorkyňa

16/05/25, 19:00 / Janáčkovo divadlo (Janáček Theatre)

Worse than a scar on the face are scars on the soul.

Her Shepherdess is one of Janáček's most famous works and is a permanent part of the repertoire of the Brno Opera. It started with a realistic drama by Gabriela Preissová, which the composer himself adapted into the form of an opera libretto. Although he had to significantly shorten the text of the drama, he succeeded in deepening the effect of the tragic story from the Moravian countryside. The spendthrift and fickle Števa, the fierce and yet at heart kind Laca, and above all the inexorable Kostelnička, whose efforts to maintain her position and respect in the village community will lead her to murder the child of her shelter, Jenůfa. Janáček (1854–1928) captured the individual characters in a masterly dramatic shorthand that is chilling and at the same time evokes compassion and understanding in us. The final form of the work, marked by the death of the composer's daughter Olga, led to a long and thorny road. After the successful premiere in Brno in 1904, her pastor had to wait twelve long years before Janáček's efforts were crowned with well-deserved success on other domestic and foreign stages.



Listening Guide: Leoš Janáček's Sinfonietta
with Jakub Hrůša
  more