A spiritual musical journey from the Middle Ages to the present day, guided by two male voices, a solo cello, and a dance ensemble.   

The artistic vocal duo Kchun, tenor Martin Prokeš and baritone Marek Šulc, and the dance ensemble Dekkadancers, who sum up their artistic strategy with the motto “we dance with our hearts and think with our knees”, are united by their enthusiasm for the work of contemporary Italian composer Marco Rosano. In 2004, he set the text of the Latin Stabat Mater sequence expressing the pain of the Virgin Mary under the cross of Christ.   

Rosano’s composition in a style imitating Baroque music will be preceded by three pieces, a selection from J. S. Bach’s Suite No. 2 in D minor for cello performed by Eduard Šístek, a music and sound collage by Dekkadancers member Ondřej Vinklát, and the Ave Generosa Hymn by musician and Benedictine nun Hildegard of Bingen, a prominent Christian mystic and promoter of Marian devotion.

Where is home? Is it where did we spent our childhood? Or in our memories, when we can no longer return to such a place? Perhaps, home is where we choose to live? Contralto Bella Adamova and pianist Michael Gees ponder these questions in their musical journey entitled there is home.  

The seemingly disparate duo – Gees was born in West Germany in 1950’s, Adamova in the North Caucasus just after the collapse of the Soviet Union – formed in 2015, and four years later, the musicians released the album Blooming. They presented in it a set of spontaneous compositions in the spirit of classical music. In there is home, they interweave their improvisations with the songwriting by composers such as Mahler, Mussorgsky, Britten, and Pavel Haas. 

“Free improvisation isn’t really a genre so much as a philosophy of playing,” Adamova says. “There are no rules, just that you’re in touch with the other players, with the place you’re playing, and that you listen and respect what you hear.”

Where is home? Is it where did we spent our childhood? Or in our memories, when we can no longer return to such a place? Perhaps, home is where we choose to live? Contralto Bella Adamova and pianist Michael Gees ponder these questions in their musical journey entitled there is home.  

The seemingly disparate duo – Gees was born in West Germany in 1950’s, Adamova in the North Caucasus just after the collapse of the Soviet Union – formed in 2015, and four years later, the musicians released the album Blooming. They presented in it a set of spontaneous compositions in the spirit of classical music. In there is home, they interweave their improvisations with the songwriting by composers such as Mahler, Mussorgsky, Britten, and Pavel Haas. 

“Free improvisation isn’t really a genre so much as a philosophy of playing,” Adamova says. “There are no rules, just that you’re in touch with the other players, with the place you’re playing, and that you listen and respect what you hear.”

In 2021, Blue Note released the album Squint. It features eleven tracks performed by the trio of Julian Lage, Jorge Roeder, and Dave King. For guitarist Lage, the leader of the group, it was the culmination of a successful career that has led from a Grammy nomination for his 2009 album Sounding Point to collaborations with Gary Burton, a vibraphonist with an unmistakable sound, and musical chameleon, saxophonist and composer John Zorn.  

They met double bassist Jorge Roeder in 2007, when Lage moved from California and Roeder from Lima, the capital of Peru. When they’re not performing with Dave King (co-founder of The Bad Plus), Lage and Roeder creatively recapitulate American musical history in their performances together, taking into account jazz, blues, and Roeder’s Afro-Peruvian musical roots.

On the cover of the album Hárr, the great-great-grandfather of composer and violinist Benedicte Maurseth sits while a herd of reindeer grazes behind him. Apart from the photo, there is a short recording of his voice. It’s a bond that spans generations, and one that predestined Maurseth for her career as a successful composer and performer on the Hardanger violin, a Norwegian folk stringed instrument. In her compositions and improvisations, she does not try to construct a utopian past. With her ancient instrument, she speaks to our time through evocative rhythms, melodic flexibility, and surprising harmonies defined by the rich resonance of the instrument and its strings.   

In addition to her solo pieces, she will play several duets in Prague with her fellow countryman, Sigbjørn Apeland, an ethnomusicologist with an interest in church and folk music, organist, and long-time member of the Norwegian improvisation scene. The program will also include the world premiere of a new work by Benedicte Maurseth, which the duo of artists will perform together with the PMP Ensemble.

Organized by Prague Music Performance in cooperation with Music is. 

The Music Is Festival offers the opportunity to purchase a full festival ticket for a discounted price of CZK 1,300 with a ‘Music Is’ t-shirt and a bag as a bonus. For the reduced price, attendees will be guaranteed a seat at all concerts from June 8 to November 9, 2023. 

The festival pass includes reserved seating ticket for concerts at Divadlo X10 and a reserved standing for the concert at the Jazz Dock. Once purchased, you will be asked to confirm attendance at least 3 days before each concert. We do this to ensure that the capacity of the venue is always fully utilised. If you are unable to attend any of the concerts, we will pass your place on to others. You will be able to collect your bag and t-shirt from the box office at any of the selected concerts. 

“We are both tempted to dress things up in darker shades. Often we start with a happy melody, which we can then play with in different ways, distorting it.”  

So much for guitarist Mary Halvorson’s collaboration with pianist Sylvie Courvoisier. The two experienced improvisers were introduced to an international audience in 2017 when their album Crop Circles was released. Now they are coming to Prague to present their project Searching for Disappeared Hour, in which the peculiar artists playfully and unexpectedly balance between improvisation and composed sections, into which they often sneak less and more familiar quotations from the classical and jazz canon. Searching for Disappeared Hour is one of The Wire’s Top 10 jazz and improvisational albums of 2021.  

The New York Times described Courvoisier as a performer building bridges between free jazz and European classical music, and Halvorson as a deconstructive guitar improviser. Both women have capitalized on their distinctive talents in independent projects, including collaborations with John Zorn and Anthony Braxton.