Pohled z parku na navrhovanou koncertní budovu

pro Janáčkovu filharmonii.

Janáček Philharmonic Ostrava

to Open 66th Concert Season,

High Hopes for New Concert Hall

Pianist Lukáš Vondráček, violinists Sergey Khachatryan and Alena Baeva, or pop artists Tomáš Klus

and David Koller: these are just a few brilliant soloists who will join the Janáček Philharmonic Ostrava

in the 2019/2020 season. World-famous conductors (Vassily Sinaisky, Dmitri Jurowski, Gábor

Takácz-Nagy, and others) will also make appearances, partially because the orchestra is conducting

an extensive, intensive search for a new conductor.

The 66th concert season programme for the Janáček

Philharmonic shows a range of enticing performances.

The audience will undoubtedly enjoy Beethoven’s

Eroica, the “Birds Concerto”, and Beethoven’s Piano

Concerto No. 4. Which events does JFO director Jan

Žemla recommend? “If you have an open mind and want

to physically feel the effect of a large orchestra, I recommend

that you come and enjoy the Leningrad Symphony

by Dmitri Shostakovich, or Symphonie fantastique by

Hector Berlioz. Yet if you do not feel like having the full-power

classics, we offer a cycle of commented concerts subtitled

‘Love at First Listen’ or the popular series ‘Gong’.”

The JFO’s cycle of piano recitals with leading artists

will continue with Marián Lapšanský, Alexei Volodin

of the Russian Piano School, brilliant French artist PierreLaurent Aimard, and Briton Paul Lewis, famous for his

interpretations of Schubert and Beethoven. Corresponding

to the increasingly excellent reputation of the orchestra

is the increasing number of invitations to national and

international music festivals. The 2019/2020 season will

take the JFO on tour in Asia and to concerts in Germany

and Poland. The orchestra played in these neighbouring

countries last year to experience the atmosphere and

architecture of recently built concert halls. This experience

will be tested when a new home for the orchestra is built,

with its plans coming to fruition some time in the relatively

near future.

The winner of the competition to build the JFO new

concert hall is the American studio Steven Holl Architects

+ Architecture Acts. The current Heritage Building of the

Cultural Centre of the City of Ostrava will be extended

with a shell in the shape of an instrument case made of

glass and steel whose “eye” will look in the adjacent park.

Not only will Ostrava get a building of world-class

architecture, the new concert hall will allow audiences to

truly enjoy the sound and art of the orchestra. “This will

be a crucial point in the history of the orchestra; Ostrava

has been lacking a hall with proper acoustic qualities for

a philharmonic orchestra. We badly need a hall like this,”

according to Jan Žemla, who cannot wait for the new

hall to open in 2024, the year celebrating the Janáček

Philharmonic Ostrava’s 70th anniversary.

Text:

Jana Knižátková

Foto:

archiv MMO

www.jfo.cz

POSITIV 3/2019 ǀ 91