The Janáček Philharmonic Orchestra is a noted orchestra based in Ostrava

Ostrava

Ostrava is the third largest city in the Czech Republic and the second largest urban agglomeration after Prague. Located close to the Polish border, it is also the administrative center of the Moravian-Silesian Region and of the Municipality with Extended Competence. Ostrava was candidate for the...

 in the northeast of the Czech Republic

Czech Republic

The Czech Republic is a landlocked country in Central Europe. The country is bordered by Poland to the northeast, Slovakia to the east, Austria to the south, and Germany to the west and northwest....

. It is named after the famous Czech composer Leoš Janáček

Leoš Janácek

Leoš Janáček was a Czech composer, musical theorist, folklorist, publicist and teacher. He was inspired by Moravian and all Slavic folk music to create an original, modern musical style. Until 1895 he devoted himself mainly to folkloristic research and his early musical output was influenced by...

. The orchestra was established in 1954 and has toured all across the world. At present it is a 116 piece orchestra and since 1997 the orchestra has concentrated on performing recent compositions by composers such as Earle Brown

Earle Brown

Earle Brown was an American composer who established his own formal and notational systems...

, John Cage

John Cage

John Milton Cage Jr. was an American composer, music theorist, writer, philosopher and artist. A pioneer of indeterminacy in music, electroacoustic music, and non-standard use of musical instruments, Cage was one of the leading figures of the post-war avant-garde...

, Maria de Alvear

Maria de Alvear

Maria de Alvear is a Spanish-German composer living in Germany who was born to Spanish father and German mother.-References:*- External links :* * *...

, Morton Feldman

Morton Feldman

Morton Feldman was an American composer, born in New York City.A major figure in 20th century music, Feldman was a pioneer of indeterminate music, a development associated with the experimental New York School of composers also including John Cage, Christian Wolff, and Earle Brown...

, Petr Kotik

Petr Kotik

Petr Kotik is a composer, conductor and flutist living in New York City. He was educated in Europe...

, Alvin Lucier

Alvin Lucier

Alvin Lucier is an American composer of experimental music and sound installations that explore acoustic phenomena and auditory perception. A long-time music professor at Wesleyan University, Lucier was a member of the influential Sonic Arts Union, which included Robert Ashley, David Behrman, and...

, Pauline Oliveros

Pauline Oliveros

Pauline Oliveros is an American accordionist and composer who is a central figure in the development of post-war electronic art music....

, Somei Satoh

Somei Satoh

Somei Satoh is a Japanese composer.In the post-Takemitsu era, Somei Satoh is a Japanese composer of contemporary traditional music ....

, Martin Smolka

Martin Smolka

Martin Smolka is a contemporary Czech composer of classical music.- Works :1983* Slzy ;1985-19881988* Music for Retuned Instruments;1989* Zvonění for solo percussion;* Nocturne;...

, Karlheinz

Karlheinz

Karlheinz may refer to:* Karlheinz Böhm , Austrian actor* Karlheinz Brandenburg , audio engineer* Karlheinz Deschner , German agnostic...

 Stockhausen, Toru Takemitsu

Toru Takemitsu

was a Japanese composer and writer on aesthetics and music theory. Largely self-taught, Takemitsu possessed consummate skill in the subtle manipulation of instrumental and orchestral timbre...

, Edgard Varese

Edgard Varèse

Edgard Victor Achille Charles Varèse, , whose name was also spelled Edgar Varèse , was an innovative French-born composer who spent the greater part of his career in the United States....

, and Christian Wolff

Christian Wolff (composer)

Christian G. Wolff is an American composer of experimental classical music.-Biography:Wolff was born in Nice in France to German literary publishers Helen and Kurt Wolff, who had published works by Franz Kafka, Robert Musil, and Walter Benjamin. After relocating to the U.S...

.

In 2008, the orchestra performed the world premiere of Rachmaninoff/Warenberg: Piano Concerto "No. 5" a derivative work of Rachmaninoff's Symphony No. 2 arranged as a concertante for piano and orchestra by Alexander Warenberg. The recording was issued on the Brilliant Classics label and was largely well-received though not being an original work of Sergei Rachmaninoff

Sergei Rachmaninoff

Sergei Vasilievich Rachmaninoff was a Russian composer, pianist, and conductor. Rachmaninoff is widely considered one of the finest pianists of his day and, as a composer, one of the last great representatives of Romanticism in Russian classical music...

. The orchestra was led by its present director of music Theodore Kuchar

Theodore Kuchar

Theodore Kuchar is a Ukrainian American conductor of classical music and a violist.-Biography:Kuchar was born in 1960 in New York City. He started to learn to play the violin at ten years of age, later switching to viola...

with Wolfram Schmitt-Leonardy as soloist.

External links

• Ostrava Centre for New Music - Further information