Piano Recital “Voices from the East”

About the event

In this event held in cooperation with the European Partnership Association, the young award-winning Czech pianist Marek Kozák (top prize-winner of the X International Chopin Piano Competition in Darmstadt in 2013, among others) performs works by Chopin, Dvořák, Smetana, Janáček, Tchaikovsky and Rachmaninoff.

Born in Brušperk in 1993, the Czech piano virtuoso Marek Kozák has already achieved a series of impressive successes at renowned competitions. His most recent distinction, in 2021, is the prize-winner title at the Concours Géza Anda Zurich. After his success in Darmstadt he was a semi-finalist at the Fryderyk Chopin International Piano Competition in Warsaw in 2015. In 2018 he won both first prize and the audience prize at the European Piano Competition in Bremen, and he was most recently a finalist at the Busoni Competition in Bolzano.

Critics repeatedly praise his flawless technique, his sense of proportion and gradation, his great expressive range, deep musicianship and fidelity to the score.

Since graduating from the piano class of Prof. Ivan Klánský at the Academy of Performing Arts in Prague, Marek Kozák has attracted considerable attention on the Czech music scene. In February 2020 he caused a stir at his first appearance with the Prague Radio Symphony Orchestra when he performed the little-known Piano Concerto in D minor by Vítězslava Kaprálová. He has given successful performances at the Firkusný International Piano Festival, the Saint Wenceslas Music Festival (SHF) and the Dvořák Festival in Prague (project “Dvořák's Complete Works for Solo Piano”).

Already at the primary school of arts in Brušperk he showed exceptional talent and additionally developed skills as an organist and composer. At the Janáček Conservatory in Ostrava he studied two instruments – piano with Monika Tugendliebová and organ with Martina Zelová – and attended masterclasses with Eugen Indjic, Murray Perahia and Garrick Ohlsson. In 2018 his first solo CD was released with works by Haydn, Chopin, Franck, Rachmaninoff and Skoumal. Alongside his concert career he teaches at the Prague Academy of Music.

Biographies