Poetism in Dvořák’s Time

Kateřina Kněžíková is one of the most promising sopranos of her generation. In addition to her opera career, she increasingly focuses on concert repertoire, achieving success both in her native Czech Republic and abroad. Her core repertoire includes works by Antonín Dvořák, Bohuslav Martinů, Leoš Janáček, as well as the art song genre. She is the recipient of the Classic Prague Awards 2018 for Best Chamber Performance and the Thalia Award 2019 for her outstanding stage portrayal in Julietta or The Key to Dreams (B. Martinů) at the National Moravian-Silesian Theatre.

A graduate of the Prague Conservatory and the Academy of Performing Arts in Prague, Kněžíková has been a permanent member of the National Theatre Opera since 2006. Her current roles there include appearances in Rusalka, Così fan tutte, Carmen, Jenůfa, The Bartered Bride, and The Cunning Little Vixen.

She has performed at numerous festivals, including the Glyndebourne Opera Festival, Prague Spring International Music Festival, Dvořák Prague International Music Festival, and Smetana’s Litomyšl. Her collaborations with leading orchestras include the BBC Symphony Orchestra, Bamberg Symphony, Camerata Salzburg, Czech Philharmonic, Deutsches Symphonie-Orchester Berlin, London Philharmonic Orchestra, Mahler Chamber Orchestra, National Polish Radio Symphony Orchestra, ORF Vienna Radio Symphony Orchestra, Rotterdam Philharmonic Orchestra, Royal Liverpool Philharmonic Orchestra, Orchestre Philharmonique de Radio France, Orchestra dell’Accademia Nazionale di Santa Cecilia, Prague Radio Symphony Orchestra, Tokyo Symphony Orchestra, among others.

She has worked under the baton of many distinguished conductors, including Jiří Bělohlávek, Semyon Bychkov, Serge Baudo, Plácido Domingo, Asher Fisch, Manfred Honeck, Domingo Hindoyan, Jakub Hrůša, Oksana Lyniv, Tomáš Netopil, John Nelson, Petr Popelka, and Robin Ticciati.

In 2021, Kněžíková released her debut solo album “Phidylé” with Supraphon, which was named Editor’s Choice and listed among Gramophone's Best Classical Albums of 2021, also winning the BBC Music Magazine Award in the Vocal category. Her discography with Radioservis includes the albums “Fantasie” and “K2”. In September 2024, she released “Tag und Nacht” with Jakub Hrůša and the Bamberg Symphony under the Supraphon label.

In December 2024, she made a highly successful debut with the Czech Philharmonic at Carnegie Hall, conducted by Semyon Bychkov.

source: Agentura Camerata

With “a voice that apparently can do anything,” blessed with a “warm, sumptuous timbre” (Classica), “different, immediately recognisable, and exceptional” (Aktualne.cz), and whose “interpretation presents a captivating kaleidoscope of vocal expressive possibilities” (Opera Plus), mezzo-soprano Bella Adamova’s artistic commitment on the concert and operatic stage spans a wide range of musical periods, genres, and cultures, from the Baroque to the contemporary, with natural ease. She places particular focus on the art-song repertoire, showcased in deeply and thoughtfully crafted recital programmes.

She has released two critically acclaimed albums with pianist Michael Gees—Blooming (2019) and There is Home (2023)—which explore the concept of searching for and defining the feeling of home through songs by Pavel Haas, Benjamin Britten, Gustav Mahler, and Modest Mussorgsky, freely intertwined and organically interspersed with improvisations on selected poems.

Adamova has won numerous awards at international competitions. In 2022, she won the main prize in the oratorio category at the International Vocal Competition in 's-Hertogenbosch and, together with pianist Malte Schäfer, was named a laureate in the Lied duo category at the Franz Schubert and Modern Music Competition in Graz. She has also received the top prize at the International Robert Schumann Competition (2021), the Walter and Charlotte Hamel Prize at the Bundeswettbewerb Gesang in Berlin, the Czech Song Prize at the Emmy Destinn Awards in London, and the Bohuslav Martinů Foundation Prize at the International Antonín Dvořák Competition. BBC Music Magazine recently featured her as a rising star.

Recent highlights include her BBC Proms and Dvořákova Praha debuts with Jakub Hrůša and the Czech Philharmonic in Janáček’s Glagolitic Mass, de Falla’s El amor brujo with the Bohuslav Martinů Philharmonic and Robert Kružík, the alto solos in Mahler's Second and Eighth Symphonies with the Prague Symphony Orchestra (FOK) and Tomáš Brauner, Mozart’s Requiem with the West Bohemian Symphony Orchestra and conductor Alena Hron, and Berlioz’s Les nuits d’été with the Baborák Ensemble. On the opera stage, she appeared at Theater Bielefeld as Mercédès in Carmen and at the National Theatre in Prague as the Third Woodsprite in a new staging of Rusalka (directed by the SKUTR duo/conducted by Tomáš Netopil). She debuted at the Prague Spring Festival in a solo recital and has performed at prestigious venues and festivals such as Heidelberger Frühling, the St. Wenceslas Music Festival (SHF), Music is… Festival, the Czech Center New York, and Villa Senar, the Swiss residence of Sergei Rachmaninov.

Her upcoming engagements include Mahler’s Rückert-Lieder and the orchestral songs of Alma Mahler with Gregor Mayrhofer and the Prague Radio Symphony Orchestra (SOČR), Schubert’s Winterreise at the Litomyšl Musical Evenings, a programme of Charles Ives, Debussy’s Trois chansons de Bilitis, and Schumann’s Liederkreis nach Eichendorff, Op. 39, at Zámek Žďár nad Sázavou, and Handel arias with Tomáš Netopil and Ensemble Colloredo.

Bella Adamova was born in Grozny, Chechnya, and grew up in Prague. She completed her musical studies in Cologne, Hanover, and at London's Trinity Laban Conservatoire of Music and Dance, studied improvisation at the Basel Academy of Music, and received additional training at the Royaumont Foundation and the Tanglewood Music Center, the Boston Symphony Orchestra's summer academy. She has had the privilege of learning from, among others, Anne Sofie von Otter, Christoph Prégardien, Thomas Hampson, Simon Keenlyside, Jan Philip Schulze, Dawn Upshaw, Christian Immler, and Kateřina Kněžíková.

source: Agentura Makropulos

David Švec studied piano and conducting at the Conservatory in České Budějovice and at the Janáček Academy of Performing Arts in Brno. In February 2000, he participated in conducting masterclasses with Sir Colin Davis in Dresden, and in 2002, he completed a study stay at the Universität für Musik und darstellende Kunst in Vienna. In 2004, he won the Bösendorfer Prize in the Opera Coaching category at the Belvedere International Competition in Vienna.

As a pianist, he has collaborated with the Prague Chamber Orchestra since 1998 and is a sought-after chamber musician. He regularly performs with leading Czech singers, including soprano Eva Urbanová, bass-baritone Adam Plachetka, and soprano Kateřina Kněžíková. With the latter two, in addition to recitals at prestigious festivals, he has also recorded song albums—Fantasie with Kateřina Kněžíková in 2021 and Evening Songs with Adam Plachetka in 2024. He continues to perform as a solo pianist, his most recent project being a concert performance and recording of Gershwin’s Rhapsody in Blue with the South Bohemian Philharmonic, set to be released in 2025.

While still studying, he worked at the Janáček Opera in Brno, where he conducted numerous opera and ballet productions. In September 2003, he joined the Opera of the National Theatre in Prague, where he has held a permanent conducting position since 2011. His repertoire includes dozens of opera and ballet productions, such as The Magic Flute, The Bartered Bride, The Jacobin, Don Giovanni, The Devil and Kate, Rusalka, and Medea. He has also introduced several operas in Czech premieres, most recently Paul Hindemith’s Tuttifäntchen in 2023. Notable lesser-known works include the modern premiere of Jaroslav Křička’s The White Lord, staged at the National Moravian-Silesian Theatre in Ostrava in 2021.

In January 2022, he became Chief Conductor of the South Bohemian Theatre in České Budějovice. One of his first projects there was a staged performance of Handel’s oratorio Messiah at the theatre with revolving auditorium in Český Krumlov, which was recorded by Czech Television and distributed worldwide by Unitel in August 2023.

As a conductor, he frequently collaborates with leading Czech symphony orchestras in concert performances, as well as in recordings with the Prague Radio Symphony Orchestra.

His international engagements include collaborations with Teatro Liceo in Barcelona, Opéra National de Paris, Opéra de Lyon, Wiener Staatsoper, Theater an der Wien, Glyndebourne Festival, and Salzburger Festspiele. Since 2017, he has also worked with the Slovenian National Theatre in Ljubljana, where he has conducted new productions of The Bartered Bride and Luisa Miller.

In 2014, he created a new piano reduction of Leoš Janáček’s The Makropulos Case for Bärenreiter, which was first used in a production of the opera at Bayerische Staatsoper in Munich.

Since October 2024, he has been teaching conducting at the Janáček Academy of Performing Arts in Brno.

source: Agentura Camerata