PRESS RELEASE August 5, 2025
The Moravian Autumn International Music Festival, whose 53rd edition will take place from October 12 to 26, will commemorate the 100th anniversary of the birth of Sir Charles Mackerras. Brno will welcome top British orchestras in which he performed. At the opening concert, Mackerras’ daughter Catherine will present an award named after her father for artists under 40 who have made a significant contribution to the interpretation of Czech music, especially Leoš Janáček. “Sir Mackerras was known not only as one of the world’s greatest conductors, but also as one of the greatest connoisseurs of Janáček’s music. He came to Brno many times to conduct or study his compositions, and even learned Czech for this purpose. He also conducted our orchestra several times,” said Marie Kučerová, director of the Filharmonie Brno, which organizes the festival.
Janáček’s Sinfonietta will therefore be a must at the opening concert, performed by the renowned BBC Concert Orchestra with the Prague Castle Guard and Czech Police Band. The orchestra will bring to Brno a program of so-called musical sparklers, which Mackerras focused on during his time as chief conductor of this orchestra. “The orchestra will be led by its chief conductor, Anna-Maria Helsing. She conducted the Filharmonie Brno at the Easter Festival in the spring and was greatly admired by the audience. We look forward to her return,” said festival dramaturge Vítězslav Mikeš.
The festival will feature two orchestras led by Mackerras, both of which are among the world’s best: the Scottish Chamber Orchestra and London’s Orchestra of the Age of Enlightenment. The former will perform the festival’s overture on September 23 together with internationally renowned bagpiper Robert Jordan. This concert is already sold out. The London Orchestra of the Age of Enlightenment will then travel to Brno with Georg Friedrich Händel’s oratorio King Solomon. This magnificent work for soloists, choir and orchestra will be performed at the Janáček Theater on October 19. “The Enlightenment Orchestra is known throughout the world for its informed interpretation of early music. Its conductor, John Butt, is an international star in this field, so it is sure to be an extraordinary evening,” Mikeš said.
In addition to the orchestras where Mackerras worked, the festival will also feature composers close to him, such as Claudio Monteverdi. The festival’s closing concert will present his perhaps best-known work, the monumental spiritual composition Vespers for the Blessed Virgin, performed by the French ensemble La Tempête. “This spiritual opera is a masterpiece in itself, but the ensemble’s artistic director, Simon-Pierre Bestion, has also interwoven French faux-bourdons from a 17th-century manuscript in Carpentras and Gregorian chants in a unique solo performance by a female singer. The result is a deeply spiritual, innovative opus tinged with Mediterranean exoticism,” emphasized Kučerová, adding that the atmosphere is enhanced by the use of stage and off-stage space, dance, light design, and other scenic effects.
The position of a program staple will be confirmed this year by The Last Pagan Rites, an oratorio that will be performed for the fourth time at the Moravian Autumn. “When we premiered it in 2017, we were all completely captivated. We included it a second time unplanned when its author, Bronius Kutavičius, died in 2021, just a few days before the start of the festival. The success with the audience and the enthusiasm of the Kantiléna children’s choir prompted us to repeat this work in 2023, again with a full church. This year, we will try a different venue for the first time, the magical water towers on Žlutý kopec,” said Mikeš. The concert is already sold out, and this is another performance on the same evening. The unique MKČ 150 project will present another great figure of Lithuanian art, Mikalojus Konstantinas Čiurlionis, whose important anniversary is being commemorated around the world.
Several compositions are being commissioned for Moravian Autumn, for example by Petr Wajsar and František Chaloupka. Pianist Sára Medková and cellist Štěpán Filípek are writing compositions for each other and will present them in the Britten & Shostakovich program with reference to these two composers.
The Czech premiere of the orchestral version of Jóhann Jóhannsson‘s IBM 1401: A User’s Manual is also in the works. This musical-dance project was inspired by the very first computer imported to Iceland in 1964 and its ability to reproduce simple monophonic melodies. “The main idea is the concept of the computer as a personified device, uniquely conveyed through the close harmony of the expressive means of music and modern dance. The movement component will be provided by the well-known Icelandic modern dancer Erna Ómarsdóttir, for whom the work was created; the musical part will be shared by Úlfur Eldjárn and the chamber orchestra Ensemble Opera Diversa conducted by Gabriela Tardonová,” Mikeš explained.
This year’s festival will also include programs for children and Nový svět Moravského podzimu (New World of Moravian Autumn), a project prepared by students of the Janáček Academy of Music and Performing Arts.
The complete festival program can be found here.
Photos from the festival can be found here.
Media contact: Kateřina Konečná, katerina.konecna@filharmonie-brno.cz, +420 775 426 040
