A recording of Smetana’s Libuše from the 2024 Prague Spring Festival is being released on the Supraphon label

On Friday 18 September, Supraphon will release the long-awaited recording of the concert performance of the opera Libuše by Bedřich Smetana from the 2024 Prague Spring Festival. In the title role stars soprano Kateřina Kněžíková, conductor Jakub Hrůša leads the Czech Philharmonic, the Prague Philharmonic Choir and other leading soloists. Maestro Hrůša says about Libuše: “Smetana truly incorporated some of the very best he was capable of creating into the score. In this sense, Libuše is one of his masterpieces. Alongside its monumentality, it features full-blooded, dramatic operatic music that I would, without hesitation, rank among the very best composed in European opera culture at that time – relatively shortly after the mid-19th century.”

All of us at the Prague Spring Festival are delighted that this brilliant, musically speaking performance of Smetana’s Libuše has been captured on an audio recording, and that along with this recording, a bit of the thrilling atmosphere of the Prague Spring Festival concerts will reach you.

The set contains three CDs which you can already order at a reduced pre-order price here. From 18 September, it will also be available on streaming platforms via this link.

The performance of Libuše at the 2024 Prague Spring Festival was part of the Smetana200 project.

Libuše at the 2024 Prague Spring Festival © Ivan Malý