With its opening concert, the festival celebrates two anniversaries. The first marks 120 years since the birth of Russian composer Dmitri Shostakovich; the second – related to Janáček – commemorates an extraordinary 100 years since the premiere of the famous Sinfonietta.

Dmitri Shostakovich
Festive Overture

Dmitri Shostakovich
Cello Concerto No. 1, Op. 107

Leoš Janáček
Sinfonietta

With its opening concert, the festival celebrates two major anniversaries. The first marks 120 years since the birth of Russian composer Dmitri Shostakovich; the second – Janáček-related – commemorates an extraordinary 100 years since the premiere of the famous Sinfonietta.

Shostakovich’s Festive Overture, Op. 96, which opens the concert, is a dazzling testament to the composer’s genius. The lightness and speed with which the work was written can hardly be matched by anyone other than the legendary Mozart. The overture was composed in the autumn of 1954, and Shostakovich reportedly needed only three days to complete it. While writing the score, he is said to have been chatting with friends, joking, and laughing at the same time. The good humour and joy that accompanied the composer during the creative process radiate from the entire piece.

The First Cello Concerto, Op. 107, written five years later, was composed for the renowned Russian cellist Mstislav Rostropovich. Living in the Soviet Union, where he faced restrictions on artistic freedom, humiliation, persecution, and psychological pressure from the secret police, Shostakovich filled the concerto with hidden irony, biting sarcasm, absurd grotesque elements, as well as deeply serious and chilling moments.

Janáček’s majestic and energetic Sinfonietta was first performed on 26 June 1926 during the 8th Sokol Festival in Prague, played by the Czech Philharmonic under conductor Václav Talich. Janáček’s original idea to write only a short brass fanfare accompanied by timpani for the Sokol parade soon evolved into a large-scale symphonic work. He dedicated it not only as a tribute to the newly established Czechoslovak state and its armed forces, but also to his home city of Brno. The magnificent opening brass fanfares have lost none of their impact to this day, and thanks to them, the Sinfonietta remains one of Janáček’s most popular and frequently performed works.