5, 6 and 7 May 2018, Weill Hall, Green Music Center, Rohnert Park, California Au Revoir, Bruno Michal Rataj: Temporis for cymbalo and large orchestra (US premiere) Jan Mikušek – cymbalo, Santa Rosa Symphony, cond. Bruno Ferrandis
29 April 2018, Landestheater Coburg, Coburg, Germany (following the cancelled performances on April 22 and 25) Antonín Dvořák: Rusalka (premiere) directed by: Tobias Heyder, music director: Roland Kluttig Cast: Judith Kuhn / Betsy Horne (Rusalka), Milen Bozhkov (Prince), Michael Lion (Water Goblin), Kora Pavelic / Gabriela Künzler (Witch), Kora Pavelic / Marlene Lichtenberg (Foreign Princess) … Read more
28 April 2018, Bohemian National Hall, New York, USA Czech American Inspiration Petr Kotík: Master-Pieces (2014-15) – New York premiere directed by: Jiří Nekvasil, David Bazika, music director: Petr Kotík S.E.M. Ensemble (Christina Kay – soprano, Steven Wilson – tenor, Jose Pietri-Coimbre – baritone, Nicholas Hay – bass, Pauline Kim Harris – violin, Liuh-Wen Ting – viola, Amanda Gookin – violoncello, Jeffrey Reinhardt – … Read more
28 April 2018, Music Department, University of California, Santa Cruz, USA Michal Rataj: Long Sentence I (American premiere) Del Sol String Quartet (Ben Kreith, Rick Shinozaki, Charlton Lee, Kathryn Bates), Ben Carson – piano
For the first time ever, Bohuslav Martinů’s operatic masterpiece The Greek Passion was performed in Russia, at the State Academic Opera and Ballet Theatre in Ekaterinburg. The premiere took place on 19 April with reprises over the following three days. The first of the opera’s two versions was directed by Thaddeus Strassberger and conducted by the theatre’s chiefconductor … Read more
At the opportunity of releasing his new album by the French Arion Music label, Kryštof Mařatka, Czech composer permanently living in Paris, presented the world premiere of his piece Fables pastorales. The concert took place on 16 April in Salle Cortot, Paris, under the auspices of Czech Republic’s ambassador to France Petr Drulák, and, as a reminder … Read more
On 1 April, Oper Frankfurt introduced their new production of Leoš Janáček’s last opera From the House of the Dead. It was created by Italian conductor Tito Ceccherini and German-French director David Hermann, who had for the last time worked with Janáček’s music only two years ago, directing The Makropulos Affair in the renowned Deutsche Oper Berlin. … Read more
„How to talk about the terrors and inhumanity of the Nazi period to kids? And how to speak about those whose names have never made it to historical literature?” These are the questions Landestheater Linz was trying to answer in their new production of Hans Krása’s children’s opera Brundibár premiered on 31 March. Conductor Martin Braun and … Read more
After 45 years, Leoš Janáček’s Cunning Little Vixen returned to the stage of Theater Hagen, North Rhine-Westphalia. The premiere on 24 March has already received a very positive critical response. The praise has concerned mainly the direction by Mascha Pörzgen, who perfectly balanced both levels of the story – a beast fable and an allegorical drama – and the performance of … Read more
Conductor Will Humburg concluded his three-year-long Janáček cycle at Staatstheater Darmstadt with a new production of The Makropulos Affair. The theatre’s general music director is already an expert when it comes to the Moravian composer; apart from Jenůfa and The Cunning Little Vixen in Darmstadt, he had also conducted Katya Kabanova a couple of years ago in Bonn. The directress Eva-Maria Höckmayer tried to depict especially the … Read more
