Štěpán Turnovský & guests

Wolfgang Amadeus Mozart
Divertimento Es dur, KV 563
Bohuslav Martinů
Sonatina pro dvoje housle a klavír, H. 198
Eugène Ysaÿe
Sonáta pro dvoje housle a moll

Štěpán Turnovský: fagot / bassoon
Fedor Rudin: housle / violin
Julia Turnovský: housle / violin
Shoko Turnovský: klavír / piano

Štěpán Turnovský – festival personality 

How are you looking forward to performing at the Smetana Days Festival in Pilsen? What is your relationship to this city and the Pilsen Philharmonic?

Dear visitors to the Smetana Days Festival, I am very pleased to be able to play for you at the House of Music in Pilsen. This city has a special meaning for me, which goes back to my childhood. My father Martin Turnovský (1928–2021) started his career in Pilsen as the Chief Conductor of a radio orchestra at the beginning of the 1960s. At home, he often talked about the city and the orchestra, and so Pilsen came alive for me even then. To the circle of his friends belonged the pianist Ivan Moravec, who, during his visits to us, used to play with pleasure my favourite piece by Bedřich Smetana, “Memories of Pilsen” (Plzeňačka).

After our emigration in 1968, these memories faded. However, many years later they returned in a specific way again, when my father, the Chief Conductor of the Gunma Symphony Orchestra in Takasaki, Japan, the twin city of Pilsen, ended his career. It was in Takasaki that we had the opportunity to play a memorial concert in his honour with this line-up in February 2024. On this basis, the wish to organize a concert in Pilsen was born, in the city where his musical career began. We decided to include, among others, the works by Bohuslav Martinů, one of my father’s favourite composers. It is an extraordinary honour for us to perform here and thus symbolically close the imaginary circle associated with my father’s legacy.