We’re heading into the third week of the festival. It will bring the most varied festival programme

This year’s 80th edition of the Prague Spring International Music Festival is heading into its third festival week, which will offer the greatest variety of genres since the festival began. From the world of French music of the late 17th century, it moves through the great romantic works of Richard Strauss and Antonín Dvořák to six world premieres by Czech and Slovak composers. On Saturday 31 May, the doors of St. Agnes Monastery will also be opened to the youngest audience members in the SpringTEEN project.

The penultimate week of the festival will open on 26 May with the Czech debut of the French ensemble Ensemble Correspondances, which brings a project from the music of Jean-Baptiste Lully to Prague Spring. The concert will feature selected movements from the operas Psyché, Atys, Persée and Armide. The excellent selection of singers is graced by the name of the recent winner of the Les Victoires de la musique award, French mezzo-soprano Lucile Richardot.

From 27 to 29 May, lovers of great orchestras and symphonic music will be in for a treat. On Tuesday, 27 May, the Wiener Symphoniker will return to the festival after thirty-three long years, led by their chief conductor Petr Popelka. Jan Bartoš will be the soloist in Beethoven’s Piano Concerto No. 5 in E flat major, called “The Emperor”.On Wednesday 28 May, we will be treated to Jan Sedláček‘s conducting debut in a programme of works by Leonard Bernstein, Sergei Prokofiev and Antonín Dvořák. Jan Sedlacek will be partnered by the Czech Radio Symphony Orchestra, and the soloist in Prokofiev’s first violin concerto will be last year’s winner of the Prague Spring Competition, the Japanese Tsukushi Sasaki. The orchestral series of concerts will culminate on Thursday 29 May with the London Symphony Orchestra with its chief conductor Antonio Pappano and violinist Lisa Batiashvili in works by Hector Berlioz, Karol Szymanowski and Richard Strauss.

Friday and Saturday will be dedicated to contemporary music. The world-famous Ensemble Modern from Frankfurt will be the star of the fourth edition of Prague Offspring, where they will begin their three-year residency. Alongside works by Prague Offspring 2025 Composer-in-Residence George Benjamin, South Korean composer Unsuk Chin and British composer Oliver Knussen, world premieres of works by Svatopluk Hořínka, Barbora Tomášková, Haštal Hapka, Jan Ryant Dřízal and Pavel Šabacki will be performed. In addition to concerts, the DOX Centre for Contemporary Art will also feature masterclasses with members of Ensemble Modern, talks and the increasingly popular Reading Lessons.

Saturday afternoon, 31 May, will be dedicated to children and teenagers in the grounds of St. Agnes Monastery. Singer and actor Jan Cina together with SpringTEEN dramaturge Klára Boudalová will guide them through the second edition of the SpringTEEN Prague Spring project. The series of concerts and workshops will culminate with the Grand Finale at 6 pm, in which the vocal sextet Skety, Jan Cina, SpringTEEN Band, the Children’s Choir of the Czech Radio, the dancing robot GoFa, participants of the afternoon workshops and composer and conductor Petr Wajsar, whose composition for this huge and unusual cast with the involvement of an instrument called the pracophon will be heard in its world premiere, will meet on one stage.Tickets for the Grand Finale and the last tickets for the workshops are available on our website.

Tune in to Prague Spring on the radio

The debut of Prague Spring on 28 May from the Smetana Hall with conductor Jan Sedláček, violinist Tsukushi Sasaki and the Czech Radio Symphony Orchestra and the first concert of Ensemble Modern on 30 May from the DOX Centre for Contemporary Art will be broadcast live from 8 pm on Czech Radio Vltava.

Current reports from the festival

can also be followed on the profiles of the Prague Spring Festival on Facebook @PrazskeJaro, Instagram @prazskejaro and YouTube @PragueSpringFestival.