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