The Prague Radio Symphony Orchestra is one of the most important contemporary Czech orchestras. From the 2022/2023 season, the Czech conductor Petr Popelka holds the position of the orchestra’s chief conductor and artistic director. Robert Jindra has been the principal guest conductor for the second year.

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In the 2023/24 concert season, the PRSO will welcome a number of notable names, which include the outstanding violinists Gidon Kremer, Christian Tetzlaff and the rising star María Dueñas. The pianists Brad Mehldau, Eldar Djangirov and Marianna Shirinyan, the harpsichordist Mahan Esfahani, and the conductors Omer Meir Wellber, Ilan Volkov and Eva Ollikainen have also accepted the invitation. A unique project presents a concert performance of the second act of Wagner’s opera Tristan and Isolde, which was preceded by a performance of the first act last season. The lead roles will be played by Michael Weinius and Elisabeth Teige. Among the domestic performers, the PRSO will present for example the mezzo-soprano Štěpánka Pučálková and the conductors Petr Altrichter and Alena Jelínková.

Over the past few years, the orchestra has collaborated with leading Czech and international conductors such as Tomáš Netopil, Petr Altrichter, Jakub Hrůša, Cornelius Meister, Alexander Liebreich, Stephan Asbury, Ion Marin, Michał Nesterowicz, Anu Tali and Wayne Marshall.

The soloists accompanied by the PRSO included the pianist Krystian Zimerman, the violinists Pierre Amoyal, Frank Peter Zimmermann and Patricia Kopatchinskaja, the cellists Gautier Capuçon, Daniel Müller-Schott, István Várdai and Steven Isserlis, the trombonist Christian Lindberg, as well as the jazzman Avishai Cohen. The singers included Renée Fleming, Elīna Garanča, José Cura, Juan Diego Flórez, Dmitri Hvorostovsky and Jonas Kaufmann. Among the local artists, one should certainly not omit Lukáš Vondráček, Ivo Kahánek, Jan Bartoš, Josef Špaček, Jan Mráček, Tomáš Jamník, Adam Plachetka, Simona Šaturová, Kateřina Kněžíková, Petr Nekoranec and Vilém Veverka. The orchestra commissions and regularly performs works by leading contemporary Czech composers such as Miroslav Srnka, Ondřej Adámek, Pavel Zemek Novák, Jan Ryant Dřízal, Šimon Voseček and Jana Vöröšová.

The recording activity of the PRSO is quite extensive as well. Let us recall the recording released by Hyperion with the harpsichordist Mahan Esfahani and the conductor Alexander Liebreich with music by Viktor Kalabis, Hans Krása and Bohuslav Martinů. The album was selected as Editor’s Choice by Gramophone magazine. The album The Mystery of Time with the music of Miloslav Kabeláč is a unique work, which complements the successful set of Kabeláč’s symphonies, released by Supraphon in 2016. The Mystery of Time received the Anděl 2022 Award, similarly as Štěpánka Balcarová’s album Happiness, which features six poems by the Polish author Julian Tuwim and is also a live recording of a joint concert with the PRSO.

The PRSO offers its audience concerts as part of subscription cycles in the Dvořák Hall of the Rudolfinum or the Betlehem Chapel as well as individually in DOX+ or in Studio 1 of Czech Radio. It is a regular guest at prominent festivals such as the Prague Spring International Music Festival, the Dvořák Prague International Music Festival, Smetana’s Litomyšl, the Leoš Janáček International Music Festival and the International Music Festival Český Krumlov. The PRSO regularly performs on international stages in Europe and Japan. 

source: Prague Radio Symphony Orchestra

One of the most prominent Czech conductors of his generation, Marek Prášil is a Conductor of the National Moravian-Silesian Theatre and made his debut at the Prague Spring Festival in 2022. In recent years, he has enjoyed growing success on international stages.

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He studied conducting and clarinet at the Janáček Conservatoire and earned two master’s degrees, first in clarinet at the Faculty of Fine Arts of Ostrava University (2012), then at Brno’s Janáček Academy of Performing Arts in orchestral conducting (2017) under the internationally renowned conductor Tomáš Hanus. In 2015 he was awarded a Bayreuther Festspiele Scholarship.

From 2020 to ’23, Marek Prášil was the principal guest conductor of the South Bohemia Philharmonic. He has worked in collaboration with most Czech and Slovak orchestras, including the Prague Philharmonia, the Janáček Philharmonic in Ostrava, the Pilsen Philharmonic, the Brno Philharmonic, the Moravian Philharmonic in Olomouc, the Bohuslav Martinů Philharmonic in Zlín, the Czech Chamber Philharmonic Orchestra in Pardubice, the North Bohemia Philharmonic in Teplice, the State Philharmonic in Košice, and the Slovak Sinfonietta. He made his international debut in Switzerland with the Biel Solothurn Symphony Orchestra. Since 2020, he has collaborated regularly with the Lithuanian National Symphony Orchestra, including a performance of Dvořák’s Te Deum and the Lithuanian premiere of Janáček’s Sinfonietta. In 2022 he made his debut with the Silesian Philharmonic in Katowice and in 2023 with the Wrocław Philharmonic at the newly built National Forum of Music in Wrocław. An important milestone was his debut at the 2022 Prague Spring International Music Festival, which was received favourably by the critics. He has also guest conducted at such international music festivals as Smetana’s Litomyšl, the Leoš Janáček International Music Festival, the Peter Dvorský International Music Festival, the Saint Wenceslas Music Festival, the South Bohemian Intermezzi, Talentinum Zlín, and Złota Lira in Poland.

Marek Prášil is engaged at the National Moravian-Silesian Theatre, conducting performances including Smetana’s operas The Brandenburgers in Bohemia and The Devil’s Wall, Donizetti’s Maria Stuart, Tchaikovsky’s Swan Lake, Martinů’s ballet The Strangler, Strauss’s operetta Night in Venice, Lloyd Webber’s musicals Jesus Christ Superstar, Evita, and Sunset Boulevard, Bernstein’s West Side Story, Lévay’s Rebecca, and much more. Among the most successful productions that he has rehearsed and conducted have been the ballet Carmina Burana and the musicals Sweeney Todd, Cats, Oliver, and Edith and Marlene, the latter having been recorded in 2022 by Czech Television.

Marek Prášil has guest conducted at the State Theatre in Košice (Bellini’s La sonnambula) and at the Silesian Theatre in Opava (Verdi’s La traviata and Kálmán’s Countess Maritza). He has often taken part as an assistant conductor in opera productions abroad: the Bayerische Staatsoper in Munich (Janáček’s Makropulos Affair, 2014 and Smetana’s Bartered Bride, 2018), the Welsh National Opera in Cardiff (Strauss’s Rosenkavalier, 2017), the Opéra National de Paris (Tchaikovsky’s Iolanta, 2019), and the National Theatre in Prague (Don Buoso, Gianni Schicchi, 2023). In July 2015 he appeared with the musical troupe of the National Moravian-Silesian Theatre at the Daegu International Music Festival in South Korea. There, the production of The Phantom of London won the festival’s main prize.

From 2007 to 2013, Marek Prášil was the conductor of the Májovák Symphonic Band, winning many awards at competitions and festivals at home and abroad (including two for the best conducting performance at international competitions in Ostrava and in Rybnik, Poland) and toured France, Italy, Austria, Norway, and Sicily. At his June 2013 farewell performance with the ensemble, he gave the Czech premiere of a complete band transcription of the cantata Carmina Burana in collaboration with the National Moravian-Silesian opera chorus and the Permoník Choral Studio.

Marek Prášil has made recordings on the German recording label Halter with the Moravian Wind Band (formerly the Central Band of the Interior Ministry of the Czech Republic) and with the Thalia Award winner Hana Fialová, and with the orchestra of the operetta/musical ensemble of the National Moravian-Silesian Theatre, he made the first professional recording in that ensemble’s history: the CD Hana/Edith with Edith Piaf’s most famous chansons. In 2018 he made a CD recording of Martin Chodúr’s Hallelujah with the Janáček Philharmonic in Ostrava, and in 2019 he recorded part of the musical Rebecca for Czech Radio. His most recent projects have been the release of a multiple CD “Covid Edition” with live recordings of concerts of the South Bohemian Philharmonic and a recording of the musical The Last Five Years by Jason Robert Brown for the National Moravian-Silesian Theatre. 

The soloists will be announced during May, after the publication of the results of the 1st round of the competition.