5. 11. 2021 | 19:30 | Church of St. Simon and Judy

Gustav Mahler was inspired to compose the song cycle The Boy's Magic Horn by a collection of German folk poetry compiled by two representatives of German Romanticism, Achim von Arnim and Clemens Brentano, . Mahler later used the motifs of these songs in his symphonies. In the period after the occupation of Czechoslovakia, when the young Gideon Klein had to interrupt the study of musicology after the introduction of the so-called Nuremberg Laws in the Protectorate of Bohemia and Moravia. At the time the Divertimento was composed, he only had two years until his transport to Terezin, and only six until his death in the Fürstengrube concentration camp. The Divertimento, is one of his most balanced compositions, pointing to the influence of Janáček and Schönberg, but it also reflects influences from neo-classicism and Moravian folk songs.

PhilHarmonia Octet (Vilém Veverka, Monika Fürbach Boušková - oboe, Irvin Venyš, Karel Dohnal - clarinet, Ondřej Vrabec, Přemysl Vojta - French horn, Martin Petrák, Václav Vonášek - bassoon)
Roman Janál - baritone

Koupit vstupenky

Program

Gideon Klein: Divertimento for wind octet

Gustav Mahler: The Boy's Magic Horn (edited by Tomáš Ill)

Roman Janál

Roman Janál, winner of the Thalia Award from 1999, is one of the few Czech performers who systematically devoted himself to songs. He studied violin at the Pilsen Conservatory and singing at the Academy of Music in Sofia. During his studies he was a guest on the stage of the State Opera in Sofia and further engagements led to Banská Bystrica, the Chamber Opera (later the Mozart Opera) in Prague and the Pilsen Opera. Since 1997 he has been a soloist at the National Theater, where he has performed many roles in the domestic and world repertoire. He has performed at the Bohuslav Martinů Days festivals in London with Jiří Bělohlávek and the BBC Orchestra, Europalia Brussels, the Bohuslav Martinů Festival in Amsterdam conducted by Christopher Hogwood, the Bratislava Music Festival, the Prague Spring, Smetana's Litomyšl, the International Music Festival in Český Krumlov, Janáček's May, St. Wenceslas festivities, Dvořák's Autumn, Pontes Festival, Czech-Saxon Festival, Concentus Moraviae, festivals in France, Italy and Germany, contemporary music festival in Boston, concert tours in Australia, Korea, Japan, France and opera festivals in San Remus, Ravenna and others.

He also collaborates with Czech Radio, where he recorded his first CD of opera arias and a number of song cycles by contemporary Czech authors. The collaboration with Czech Television created film versions of Josef Berg's operas The Return of Odysseus to His Homeland and European Tourism and Bohuslav Martinů's Tears of a Knife and The Voice of the Forest. In December 2017, he proved his ability to portray the complex tasks of contemporary music, in the title role of Miloš Orson's Štědron’s opera Don Hrabal. In 2018, he premiered a new production of Smetana's Libuše in Litomyšl , which was already staged by the National Theater on the 100th anniversary of the founding of the Czechoslovak Republic.

PhilHarmonia Octet

Currently, the most prominent representative of the so-called Czech wind school - in the European context - is the ensemble "PhilHarmonia Octet", a musical group founded in 2007 on the initiative of Vilém Veverka and Václav Vonášek. The aim of the ensemble is to significantly enrich the Czech music scene, expand the repertoire and especially to move the current standard of interpretation. The members of the ensemble are the winners of prestigious international competitions or rather graduates of foreign studies, who continue to profile themselves as solo players. The work of individual members in leading European orchestras, such as the Berlin Philharmonic, WDR Cologne and the Czech Philharmonic, is also without interest.

The ensemble's repertoire follows the changes in musical speech against the background of musical epochs and styles from the second half of the 18th century to the beginning of the new millennium.

The patronage of the Everlasting Hope (Věčná naděje) 2025 festival was taken over by:

H.E. Bettina Kirnbauer, Ambassador of the Republic of Austria to the Czech Republic
H.E. Stéphane Crouzat, Ambassador of France to the Czech Republic
Minister of Culture, Mr Martin Baxa

The opening concert on 2 February 2025 will be held under the patronage of the Ambassador of Armenia to the Czech Republic, H.E. Ashot Hovakimian.