The Janáček Brno Festival begins on Wednesday. The accompanying program will follow in the composer’s footsteps

31 October 2022, 1:00
The Janáček Brno Festival begins on Wednesday. The accompanying program will follow in the composer’s footsteps

The Janáček Brno International Opera and Music Festival enters its eighth year this year. In addition to the rich main musical program, visitors can get to know Leoš Janáček from many different angles. Accompanying activities are provided by TIC BRNO.

“Where else to go to see Janáček but to the city where he lived most of his life and where most of his works were written and first performed. What we are trying to do with our project is to make sure no one gets lost in his work and life. You can follow in the master’s footsteps on the Janáček Trail, in a guided minibus tour, or online with the Loxper app. A brand new feature this year is the audio shower of the Czech Radio, which we have jointly filled with Janáček’s music so you can literally take a shower in it. If you’re not familiar with Janáček’s music yet, believe me, this will be no cold shower,” says Jana Janulíková, director of TIC BRNO. This audio shower can be found in the Velký Špalíček shopping center during the festival.

One part of the accompanying program is a sightseeing tour in the footsteps of Leoš Janáček. It will take place on 14 November at 13:30 then on 20 November at 9:30 and 13:30. The route includes the locations where Janáček lived, composed, conducted, taught, premiered his works, walked, and met with friends. You will be guided by musicologist Jiří Zahrádka, curator of the Leoš Janáček Archive.

You can also follow in the master’s footsteps with the interactive mobile application Loxper, with which you can win a Janáček T-shirt or tickets to the festival (until 6 November). Puzzles, musical demonstrations, and animations of Janáček’s photographs await you. The first 100 winners will receive a T-shirt, and tickets will be drawn for a chance to win. In the streets of Brno you’ll even meet Janáček himself with his dog Čipera. After scanning the QR code with your mobile phone, you can listen to the wedding scene from the opera “The Cunning Little Vixen”, the fanfare from “Sinfonietta” or the overture to the opera “The Makropulos Affair”. More information here.

Janáček and his times can even be experienced through food. A taste of Janáček’s favorite dishes according to the recipes of Janáček’s housekeeper Marie Stejskalová will be offered in the next month by 9 Brno gastro venues. Just as there are 9 Janáček operas, you can look forward to 9 different delicacies. If you taste them all and collect 9 stickers, you can enter a draw for 9 copies of Marie’s cookbook. You can find the recipes Marie Stejskalová used to cook at Janáček’s in the Mara’s Cookbook and you can try them out in your kitchen. More information here.

In addition to the cookbook and the information panels, the project has also created the website www.leosjanacek.eu. You can find more news and information, play a musical memory game, or find out what kind of person Janáček was and what influenced his character, how he created, what his inspirations were, how he lived, where he lived, and what his financial situation was. TIC BRNO successfully promotes Janáček abroad, but it also focuses on the education of children in the form of educational programs.

Photo Michal Růžička

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