The Czech Christmas Mass “Hej Mistře!” has been an integral part of Czech Christmas for almost 230 years. In this concert, the JPO will join forces with leading Czech singers of the youngest generation and with the young Ostrava conductor Jiří Habart.

Jiří Trtík
New commissioned composition

Jakub Jan Ryba
Czech Christmas Carol “Hej Mistře!”

Veronika Rovná – soprano
Jarmila Vantuchová – mezzo-soprano
Daniel Matoušek – tenor
Tadeáš Hoza – baritone
Choir in session
Janáček philharmonic Ostrava
Jiří Habart – conductor

The now thirty-five-year-old composer Jiří Trtík studied conducting and composition at the Prague Conservatory and completed his composition studies at the Cleveland Institute of Music in the USA. He has composed numerous works for Czech and international performers and ensembles and his compositions have been premiered in the Czech Republic, Slovakia, Germany, Latvia, Japan, Switzerland and the USA. The culmination of the Year of Czech Music and a symbolic Christmas gift to the Ostrava audience will be his new composition commissioned by the JPO.

The Czech Christmas Carol “Hej Mistře!” has been an inseparable part of Czech Christmas for almost 230 years. Of course, when Jakub Jan Ryba composed it in 1796, he had no idea that his work would be heard in hundreds of performances across the Czech lands every year. Ryba’s Mass has gained popularity thanks to its literally Mozartian sparkle, its lovely melodies inspired by Czech folk music, and its text, which charmingly renders a simple folk story about the announcement of the Saviour’s birth and the arrival of the shepherds at the manger.

In this concert, the JPO will join forces with leading Czech singers of the youngest generation and with the young Ostrava conductor Jiří Habart, who in 2023 reached the final of the prestigious Donatella Flick LSO Conducting Competition in London.