Brno Opera Singer Richard Novák Won the Antonín Dvořák Award

26 September 2016, 14:00
Brno Opera Singer Richard Novák Won the Antonín Dvořák Award

On Friday, the Antonín Dvořák Award was officially awarded at the Ministry of Culture. The nearly 85-year-old opera singer Richard Novák, who is still active in Janáček's opera, accepted the prestigious award from the hands of Minister Daniel Herman.

A traditional crystal cello from the workshop of the Czech glassworks Moser is awarded annually to a personality, whose lifelong work or extraordinary artistic achievement significantly contributed to the promotion and popularisation of Czech classical music at home and abroad. This year, it was awarded to the Brno opera singer Richard Novák. On Friday evening, there was a concert in his honour at the Dvořák Prague Festival performed by the Czech Philharmonic Orchestra and the Prague Philharmonic Choir under the direction of Jiří Bělohlávek (among other things, the holder of the Antonín Dvořák Award).

Bassist Richard Novák will soon celebrate his 85th birthday. He is still an active artist in his venerable age. A large part of his life and artistic activities relate to Brno and Janáček's opera. During his opera career, he has performed over 150 opera roles.

Richard Novák/ Photo: Archive

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 Musicmore

For the fourth subscription concert of the Philharmonic at Home serieswhich 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