Influencers of Resonance
2018/2019 piano recitals
8. 4. 2019
JAN BARTOŠ
Jan Bartoš is one of the most prominent pianists of the young generation. The last pupil of legendary pianist Ivan Moravec excels both in his brilliant virtuoso technique and in his complex approach to interpretation. For each composition, he searches for the “right”, suitable mode of expression, regardless of any general methods and principles. Critics have those accorded him with terms such as “one of the best European pianists” or “a sensitive and refined interpreter of music”, and his mentor, the living legend that is Alfred Brendel, regards him as one of his most striking young colleagues with “a profound, meditative musicianship”. He made his debut aged 14 in the Dvořák Hall of the Rudolfinum with the Prague Philharmonia under Jiří Bělohlávek, who also directed the Czech Philharmonic when it accompanied Bartoš on his Supraphon debut – a CD with Mozart’s piano concertos released in August 2017. And as coincidence would have it, he also played with Bělohlávek at his last concert in Polička in June 2017, where he performed Bohuslav Martinů’s Double Concerto with the Prague Philharmonia.
Jan Bartoš began playing the piano when he was five years old. He chose a musical specialisation at Jan Neruda Grammar School and, before enrolling at the Academy of Music in Prague (under professors Martin Ballý and Miroslav Langer), gained international experience under Marcel Baudet in Amsterdam. Besides Ivan Moravec, who supervised his postgraduate course, Bartoš was also influenced by his teachers at the Manhattan School of Music in New York and the University of Cincinnati (Zenon Fishbein and James Tocco) and by Leon Fleisher and Boris Berman in private consultations. While in the US he also devoted himself intensely to chamber music under the direction of Robert Mann (Juilliard String Quartet) and Lawrence Dutton (Emerson String Quartet).
He is a laureate of many international competitions (for example, the Peter S. Reed Award in New York, Rotary Musikförderpreis in Nuremberg, or Concertino Praga), and he has performed in many countries throughout Europe, Asia, and the US. He has taken to the stage with famous orchestras, such as the Czech Philharmonic, the Prague Philharmonia, the Manhattan Philharmonia, or the Siam Sinfonietta. He has collaborated with numerous world-class conductors, others besides Jiří Bělohlávek include Kenneth Kiesler, A. Sebastian Weiser, Ondrej Lenárd, or Tomáš Hanus. He has received a number of prestigious awards and scholarships, which he does not like to brag about because “art can’t be measured”.
Besides his musical activities, he is also responsible for the programming of Prague Music Performance, an innovative festival and institution that he established seven years ago, which combines concerts with masterclasses and lectures. The festival has brought great musicians and personalities to Prague from diverse genres. Jan Bartoš does not limit the invitations to classical celebrities, his scope goes as far as industrial music and beyond – “it’s the content and intensity that matter; genres and pigeonholing are banal.”
