The Prague Philharmonic Choir is one of Europe’s most important choral ensembles. Founded in 1934 by the legendary choral conductor Jan Kühn, the choir’s original focus of activity as a radio ensemble soon expanded with regular concerts, while its recording activity showcased the choir’s excellence and diversity, earning it wide respect. The choir’s international renown is documented by its collaborations with many of the world’s top conductors (Riccardo Muti, Claudio Abbado, Leonard Bernstein, Zubin Mehta, Manfred Honeck, Daniel Barenboim, Fabio Luisi, Sir Simon Rattle) and orchestras (Berlin Philharmonic, Royal Concertgebouw Orchestra, Israel Philharmonic). The choir is a regular guest at prestigious music festivals abroad, and it has taken part in opera productions (La Scala, Bregenzer Festspiele). The choir also supports young talent: since 2012 it has been operating an Academy of Choral Singing with a two-year course of study for secondary-school and university students.

Lukáš Vasilek studied conducting at the Academy of Performing Arts in Prague and musicology at the Faculty of Arts of Charles University. From 1998 he was the choirmaster of the Foerster Female Chamber Choir, with which he won a number of awards at prestigious international competitions. From 2005 to 2007 he was the second choirmaster of the opera chorus at Prague’s National Theatre, where he directed rehearsals for several opera productions. Since 2007 he has been the chief choirmaster of the Prague Philharmonic Choir. His highly acclaimed work with that choir includes rehearsing and conducting a broad repertoire from various stylistic periods as well as making several recordings, including an exceptionally successful CD of cantatas by Bohuslav Martinů. Vasilek also works as an orchestral conductor and is the founder of the Martinů Voices chamber choir, where he focuses mainly on interpreting music of the 20th and 21st centuries. He actively works to popularise choral music, having served as moderator in 2012 and 2016 for two programmes on Czech Radio on the art of choral singing.

Bass Jan Martiník is a graduate of the Janáček Conservatoire in Ostrava. In 2003 he won first prize at the Antonín Dvořák International Singing Competition in Karlovy Vary, and in 2007 he became the youngest finalist in Plácido Domingo’s competition Operalia. Two years later, he won first prize in the Lieder category at the prestigious Cardiff Singer of the World competition. He is a regular guest at the Opera of the National Theatre in Prague, and from 2008 to 2011 he was an ensemble member with the Comic Opera in Berlin. Since the 2012/2013 season, he has been engaged as a soloist with the Berlin State Opera Unter den Linden. His repertoire spans from Mozart roles (Leoprello, Sarastro, Masetto) and Verdi characters (Pistola in Falstaff, Dottore Grenvil in La traviata) to parts in Italian verismo operas (Colline in La bohème, Betto in Gianni Schicchi). He has appeared on the concert stage with many top orchestras such as the Staatskapelle Dresden and the BBC Symphony Orchestra in collaboration with the conductors Daniel Barenboim, Zubin Mehta, Fabio Luisi, and many others. His discography includes a recording of Donizetti’s Requiem with Collegiem 1704.

Petr Nekoranec, a rising star of the tenor firmament, graduated from the Pardubice Conservatoire. He launched his meteoric artistic career at the age of twenty, when he won two prizes at the Antonín Dvořák International Singing Competition in Karlovy Vary. Two years later, he won several prizes at the Prague Spring International Music Competition, and in 2014 he won second prize at the Concours International de Chant in Toulouse, France. In 2017 he was the overall winner of the prestigious Francesco Viñas International Competition Singing in Barcelona. From 2014 to 2016 he was an ensemble member with the Bavarian State Opera in Munich, where he sang several parts, including the title roles in Rossini’s Le comte Ory and in Britten’s Albert Herring. For the latter role, he was awarded the Bavarian Arts Prize. In 2016 he took part in the Lindemann Programme at New York’s Metropolitan Opera as the first Czech in history to do so. Since September 2018 he has been engaged as a soloist with the Stuttgart Opera, where he is appearing as Rossini’s Count Almaviva (Barber of Seville) and Ramiro (La Cenerentola) and Donizetti’s Ernesto (Don Pasquale).

Mezzo-soprano Markéta Cukrová has long been an especially sought-after performer of early music. In that field, she has collaborated with such leading specialist ensembles as Collegium 1704, Collegium Vocale Gent, La Risonanza, Mala Punica, and Musica Florea. Her scope as a performer is much wider, however. She has appeared with the Czech Philharmonic, Brno Philharmonic, and Warsaw Philharmonic in repertoire of the nineteenth and twentieth centuries in collaboration with the conductors Jiří Bělohlávek, Jakub Hrůša, and Jan Latham-Koenig. Besides her extensive concert repertoire, she also has to her credit a number of roles in operas by Handel, Rossini, and Monteverdi. She has taken part in a number of dramaturgically revelatory recording projects, including a recording of Italian arias by Jan Dismas Zelenka and of the Stabat Mater by Jakub Jan Ryba. She also teaches master classes for young singers. In 2018 she was nominated for a Thalia Award, and she made her first appearance at the Dvořák Prague Festival in a performance of Dvořák’s Mass in D Major.

Soprano Simona Šaturová is from Bratislava, where she graduated from the conservatoire. She has built her outstanding reputation primarily upon the Mozart repertoire (including the roles of Donna Anna, Pamina, Konstanze, Susanna, and Despina), but she also devotes herself to Italian bel canto and the music of the Baroque and Romantic eras. She makes frequent guest appearances at such important European opera houses as the Théâtre de la Monnaie in Brussels, the Aalto-Musiktheater in Essen, the Oper Frankfurt, and the Théâtre du Châtelet in Paris. In the 2017/18 season, she made her successful debut at the prestigious Semperoper in Dresden. She also dedicates herself intensively to the concert repertoire, with performances the Salzburg Festival, New York’s Carnegie Hall, and the Elbphilharmonie in Hamburg. Her discography includes works by Mozart, Haydn, and Mysliveček as well as music of the twentieth century. Her most recent CD recordings include a noteworthy 2018 release of Dvořák’s Moravian Duets using the composer’s own piano for the accompaniment.

Jiří Habart is a member of the youngest generation of successful Czech conductors. He is a graduate of the P. J. Vejvanovský Conservatoire in Kroměříž, and he is currently studying conducting at the Janáček Academy of Performing Arts in Brno. In 2014 he was honoured by the Bayreuth Festival scholarship programme, and he has taken part in conducting courses led by Tomáš Netopil, Kirk Trevor, Zsolt Nagy, and Mark Stringer. With the Chamber Opera of the Janáček Academy of Performing Arts in Brno he has conducted several operas, and at the 2018 Janáček Brno Festival he made an appearance with that ensemble in productions of two contemporary works: Falstaff by the composer Jiří Najvar and Unknown by Daniel Šimek. He appears regularly with the Brno Philharmonic, the Moravian Philharmonic in Olomouc, the Bohuslav Martinů Philharmonic in Zlín, the Pilsen Philharmonic, and the South Bohemia Philharmonic. Since the 2019/2020 season, he has been conducting at the National Moravian-Silesian Theatre in Ostrava, where he has so far conducted Ludwig Minkus’s ballet Don Quixote, Salieri’s opera The School of Jealousy, and Verdi’s Nabucco.

Chuhei Iwasaki is a Czech conductor from Japan. He was born at the Fish Market of Tsukiji in Tokyo in 1987. From his childhood he devoted himself to playing the violin. From 2003 until 2006 he studied at the Toho Gakuen Conservatory in Tokyo, then at the Prague Conservatory, along with composition and conducting (2007-2013). He has been conducting actively since 2012, he also studied conducting at the Academy of Performing Arts in Prague. He has been teaching at the Prague Conservatory since 2014 (a conductor of a string orchestra) and he is a conductor of the Film Philharmonic. He became chief conductor of the first Czech brass orchestra called Moravia Brass Band in 2018 and since September 2019 he has been a permanent guest conductor of the Pilsen Philharmonic. Chuhei Iwasaki also co-operates with leading orchestras in the Czech Republic and Slovakia: Czech Radio Symphony Orchestra, PKF-Prague Philharmonia, Pilsen Philharmonic, Brno Philharmonic, Hradec Králové Philharmonic, Janáček Philharmonic Ostrava, State Philharmonic Košice etc. As a theatre conductor, he currently conducts at the J.K. Tyl Theatre in Pilsen and at the Karlin Musical Theatre in Prague. He has been also a conductor of the Silesian Theatre Opava. Chuhei Iwasaki made his debut at the Prague Spring with the Hradec Králové Philharmonic in May 2018.

Conductor Tomáš Netopil, known around the world as one of the most talented Czech conductors, is now in his tenth (and final) year as the general music director of the Aalto Musiktheater and the Philharmonie Essen. This season, awaiting him on his home stage will be premieres of Wagner’s Tannhäuser, Kampe’s Dogville, and Mozart’s Marriage of Figaro. He will also be conducting a new production of Janáček’s Káťa Kabanová at the Grand Théâtre de Genève. As the Czech Philharmonic’s principal guest conductor, he will lead concerts at Prague’s Rudofinum and also at the Smetana Litomyšl and Janáček May festivals, of which he is the president. Other highlights from this season include concerts with the Orchestre de la Suisse Romande, the Yomiuri Nippon Symphony Orchestra, the Orchestre National de Montpellier, and the opening concert of the festival Concentus Moraviae, where he will be at the helm of the legendary Concentus Musicus Wien.

He is the artistic director at the successful international Summer Music Academy in Kroměříž, which he founded in 2018. Tomáš Netopil also has strong ties to the Dvořák Prague Festival: he was its artist-in-residence for the 2017 season, and in 2020 and 2021, the Dvořák Prague Youth Philharmonic appeared at the festival under his baton in cooperation with his Kroměříž academy.

In addition to productions at the Aalto Musiktheater in Essen, Tomáš Netopil has led many important opera performances at the Saxon State Opera in Dresden (La clemenza di Tito, Rusalka, The Bartered Bride, The Cunning Little Vixen, Halévy’s La Juive, and Busoni’s Doktor Faust), the Vienna State Opera (Idomeneo, Die Freischütz, Leonore), the Dutch National Opera (Jenůfa), and the Grand Théâtre de Genève (The Makropulos Affair).

Tomáš Netopil has appeared on concert stages with many renowned orchestras. Besides the Essen and the Czech Philharmonic, these include the Orchestre National de France, the Vienna Symphony Orchestra, the Orchestre Philharmonique de Monte Carlo, the BBC Symphony Orchestra, Sinfonia Varsovia, Zurich’s Tonhalle-Orchester, the Orchestre de Paris, the London Philharmonic Orchestra, the Netherlands Radio Philharmonic, the RAI National Symphony Orchestra in Torino, and the Prague Symphony Orchestra.

Tomáš Netopil studied violin at the P. J. Vejvanovský Conservatoire in Kroměříž and conducting at the Academy of Performing Arts. He also continued his studies at the Royal Academy in Stockholm under Professor Jorma Panula and at the Aspen Summer Music School in the USA, where he won the top prize of the American Conducting Academy in 2003 and 2004. He returns to Aspen regularly as a guest conductor. In 2002, he won the Sir George Solti Conducting Competition in Frankfurt am Main.

Tomáš Netopil has made highly acclaimed CDs under the Supraphon, OehmsClassics, Radioservis, Dynamics labels.

Source: HarrisonParrott

The Dvořák Prague Youth Philharmonic was conceived as an ensemble focusing on the education and development of young, talented musicians. Orchestra members are under age 25 and study at conservatoires and academies of music. The players are recruited from among the attendees of the Orchestral Academy at the Summer Music Academy in Kroměříž, under the leadership of the exceptional conductor, Tomáš Netopil. Top players from the Czech Philharmonic serve as instructors for individual instrumental sections. The project’s mission is to offer these musicians qualified leadership and active experience with rehearsing a selected symphonic work in a professional manner and performing it in public. For the students, the opportunity to appear at the Dvořák Prague Festival lets them present the results of their hard work, ability, and acquired skills. At last year’s festival, the young musicians’ efforts paid off with a performance of Beethoven’s Ninth Symphony.