Marek Kozák – live from the Church of St Lawrence

MAREK KOZÁK…

“…seems to be one of the greatest Czech talents under 30, who sets a very high standard for piano performances. And unless something bars him from building on his present success, the inner voice hidden behind the tones can guide him to realise one of the most promising potentials of a fascinating and sustained growth,” reads the conclusion of Milan Bátor’s review of Kozák’s debut recording on the “Album of the Day” series of Czech Radio station Vltava. His solo CD (ArcoDiva) with compositions by Haydn, Chopin, Franck, Rachmaninoff, and Skoumal was released in 2018, when Marek Kozák reaped a rich harvest of successful competition and concert performances. In March he triumphed at the European Piano Contest Bremen, placing first and also taking the Public’s Award and the Special Prize for the Best Interpretation of a Compulsory Competition Piece; in May he debuted at the Prague Spring with Pavel Bořkovec’s Piano Concerto No. 2; in August he opened the famous Valldemossa Chopin Festival and reached the finals of the Ferruccio Busoni International Piano Competition in Bolzano, one of the world’s most demanding events of its kind. It was no surprise to see him declared Talent of the Year at the Classic Prague Awards 2019.

The 27-year-old prodigy showed extraordinary talent while yet a child at the Children’s Art School in Brušperk, near his Silesian home town of Frýdek-Místek. As a student of the Janáček Conservatoire in Ostrava, he learnt from Monika Tugendliebová while also working on his organ skills under Martina Zelová. He presents himself as both a pianist and an organist on his website, but few people know that he also takes an interest in composition. He graduated from the Academy of Music in Prague under Ivan Klánský and acquired further experience at the masterclasses of other eminent pianists (Eugen Indjic, Murray Perahia, Garrick Ohlsson, etc.). Marek Kozák is the “competition sort” – he regards contests as “windows to the world”. His student-day laurels include First Prize at the International Fryderyk Chopin Piano Competition in Mariánské Lázně in 2013, First Prize and Award for the Best Interpretation of the Works of Bedřich Smetana at the Smetana International Piano Competition in Pilsen in 2014, and his phenomenal success at the prestigious Fryderyk Chopin International Piano Competition in Warsaw a year later, where he fought his way through tough international competition to the semifinals at the age 22. He entered the 2016 Prague Spring International Music Competition to win Second Prize and the Czech Music Fund Foundation Prize for the best performance of Adam Skoumal’s The Jongleur, which will also be heard tonight and which he was the first to record for his debut CD.

In February 2020 he performed for the first time with the Prague Radio Symphony Orchestra and caused a stir with the practically unknown Piano Concerto in D minor by Vítězslava Kaprálová. Despite this year’s hamstrung concert season, Marek Kozák can boast extraordinarily successful performances at two major festivals in the Czech Republic: he appeared with solo recitals at Smetana’s Litomyšl and at the Dvořák Prague Festival, where he played Dvořák’s compositions in the festival’s project “Antonín Dvořák’s Complete Works for Solo Piano”.

Programme note

JOSEPH HAYDN (1732–1809) wrote more than sixty piano sonatas. Sonata No. 62 in E flat major Hob. XVI:52, which Haydn scholars consider the zenith of the composer’s sonata oeuvre, is one of the three “London” sonatas that he wrote during his second visit to the capital in the years 1794–95. We will appreciate the sophisticated and virtuoso instrumental stylisation of the Sonata and also the way in which the composer – inspired by the English piano mechanism – makes full use of all the different sounds the instrument was able to produce at that time. He dedicated the work to his friend Therese Jansen-Bartolozzi, a notable pianist living in London at the time who valued the composer’s favour so highly that she invited him to serve as a witness at her wedding in May 1795.

Of the thirty-two piano sonatas by LUDWIG VAN BEETHOVEN (1770–1827) the last five of these from the composer’s later period, opuses 101, 106, 109, 110 and 111, occupy an exceptional position in his oeuvre. Beethoven treated the material in these works with a sense of freedom and daring that saw him going way beyond the frontiers of the musical aesthetics of his time and, in so doing, forging a path towards the future development of music. Whereas Sonatas Opp. 101 and 106 were created more or less as solitary pieces, Sonatas Opp. 109, 110 and 111 might be seen as a triptych even if the composer assigned them individual opus numbers. They appeared within a relatively short space of time between autumn 1820 and the beginning of 1822, and Beethoven himself stated that he had written them effectively “in one go”.

The autograph of Piano Sonata No. 31 in A flat major Op. 110 bears the date 25 December 1821, yet Beethoven was still reworking the final movement after this date. Its definitive version originates from the beginning of 1822. The lyrical introductory movement is marked by a highly resourceful and colourful instrumental stylisation. Its main theme consists of two contrasting parts: the first four bars almost sound like the chords of an organ; the second part opens up a Mozartian melody, nuanced in the left hand with a simple “barrel-organ” accompaniment. The following movement, which we might take to be a scherzo of sorts (if in 2/4 time) offers a prime example of Beethoven’s distinctive sense of humour and irony. Not only is it full of unexpected accents and dynamic twists but, right at the start, the composer also loosely quotes two songs that were popular at the time, whose texts could hardly be called serious: “Unsre Katz hat Kätzchen gʼhabt” (Our cat has had kittens) and “Ich bin lüderlich, du bist lüderlich” (I’m a dissolute slob, and so are you). From a formal perspective, the final movement is one of Beethoven’s most impressive and most sophisticated sonata movements. It begins with a short, slow introduction followed by a recitative, which leads to a plaintive arioso dolente. After this comes a minor-key, three-voice fugue which is then interrupted by another arioso lament. The latter dissolves into thirteen low chords which evoke the sound of a bell tolling and prepare the ground for the continuation of the interrupted fugue. This time, however, its theme is heard in the major key, moreover, in inversion and, later on, also in augmentation, and at the close of the movement it finally lights up above a richly figured accompaniment.

The songs of the Venetian gondoliers, known as barcaruola, inspired a number of composers in their work. The best known vocal barcarolle occurs in Offenbach’s opera The Tales of Hoffmann, and the most famous piano barcarolle was written by FRYDERYK CHOPIN (1810–1849). Barcarolle in F sharp major Op. 60 is one of the most popular pieces in the piano repertoire today. Its graceful, mellifluous melodies flow gently and serenely above a pleasantly lilting accompaniment, inviting listeners to daydream for a while. Chopin dedicated it to Baroness Clotilde von Stockhausen who, together with her art-loving husband, the Hanoverian ambassador in Paris and Chopin’s patron, was a member of the composer’s close circle of friends.

SERGEI RACHMANINOFF (1873–1943), composer and pianist in one, would also adapt the works of other composers for his performance needs; one such composition is Lullaby, the first piece of the 1873 song cycle Six Romances Op. 16 by PYOTR ILYICH TCHAIKOVSKY (1840–1893). Rachmaninoff’s transcription was first published in New York in 1941. The simplicity of the original gave rise to a composition at once imbued with a romantic spirit and brilliantly showcasing the supreme possibilities of piano technique.

The Jongleur by ADAM SKOUMAL (b. 1969) was commissioned by the Prague Spring for the Prague Spring International Music Competition 2016. Here the composer was freely inspired by the colourful lives of mediaeval itinerant entertainers and, as a motto, chose an anonymous mediaeval quotation included in the printed edition of his Jongleur: “I can play the lute, vielle, pipe, bagpipe, harp, fiddle, psaltery and tabor… I can jump rope, most extraordinary and amusing. I can balance chairs and make tables dance. I can throw knives into the air, and catch them without cutting my fingers. I can somersault, and walk doing a handstand. I can sing a song well, and make tales to please young ladies, and can play the gallant for them if necessary…”

Věroslav Němec

English translation by Karolina Hughes / Adam Prentis