Summer Concerts • Lobkowicz trio

All three members of Lobkowicz Trio are renowned soloists and chamber players. The ensemble embraced their experience from many stages home and abroad on the International Johannes Brahms Competition 2014 in Pörtschach, Austria, where they won the First Prize and the Prize of the Audience.
The ensemble performed at prestigious festivals in Czech Republic, (Prague Spring, Dvorak´s Prague, Janáček´s May) Austria, (Neues Künstlerforum) Italy (Il Timbro festival) and Germany. Respected website operaplus.cz marked Lobkowicz Trio concert in Prague with 100% and consider them as one of the most promising czech chamber ensembles.
Thanks to their coordination, convincing interpretation, precise technical level and refined intonation, the ensemble attracts recognition of the audiences and the professional community alike.
The ensemble's name points to a traditional connection of Lobkowicz house with many composers of the 18th and 19th centuries. Ludwig van Beethoven dedicated his Triple Concerto for piano, violin, violoncello and orchestra, one of the highlights of trio repertoire, to the Prince Lobkowicz. The ensemble received permission to use this name from Mr. Jaroslav Lobkowicz.

The Czech violinist Jan Mráček was born in 1991 in Pilsen and began studying violin at the age of five with Magdaléna Micková. From 2003 he studied with Jiří Fišer, graduating with honors from the Prague Conservatory in 2013, and until recently at the University of Music and the Performing Arts in Vienna under the guidance of the Vienna Symphony concertmaster Jan Pospíchal.

As a teenager he enjoyed his first major successes, winning numerous competitions, participating in the master classes of Maestro Václav Hudeček – the beginning of a long and fruitful association. He won the Czech National Conservatory Competition in 2008, the Hradec International Competition with the Dvořák concerto and the Janáček Philharmonic Orchestra in 2009, was the youngest Laureate of the Prague Spring International Festival competition in 2010, and in 2011 he became the youngest soloist in the history of the Czech Radio Symphony Orchestra. In 2014 he was awarded first prize at Fritz Kreisler International Violin Competition at the Vienna Konzerthaus. When the victory of Jan Mráček was confirmed, there was thunderous applause from the audience and the jury. The jury president announced, “Jan is a worthy winner. He has fascinated us from the first round. Not only with his technical skills, but also with his charisma on stage.”

Jan Mráček has performed as a soloist with world’s orchestras, including the Royal Philharmonic Orchestra, St. Louis Symphony, Symphony of Florida, Tchaikovsky Symphony Orchestra, Kuopio Symphony Orchestra, Romanian Radio Symphony, Lappeenranta City Orchestra (Finland) as well as the Czech National Symphony Orchestra, Prague Symphony Orchestra (FOK), Janáček Philharmonic Orchestra and almost all Czech regional orchestras.

Jan Mráček had the honor of being invited by Maestro Jiří Bělohlávek to guest lead the Czech Philharmonic Orchestra in their three concert residency at Vienna’s Musikverein, and the European Youth Orchestra under Gianandrea Noseda and Xian Zhang on their 2015 summer tour. He has been a concertmaster of the Czech Philharmonic since 2018.

In 2008 he joined the Lobkowicz Piano Trio, which was awarded first prize and the audience prize at the International Johannes Brahms Competition in Pörtschach, Austria in 2014.

His recording of the Dvořák violin concerto and other works by this Czech composer under James Judd with the Czech National Symphony Orchestra was recently released on the Onyx label and has received excellent reviews.

Jan Mráček plays on a Carlo Fernando Landolfi violin, Milan 1758, generously loaned to him by Mr Peter Biddulph.

Ivan Vokáč has entered his second season with the Czech Philharmonic as concert master of the cello section. He has collaborated with the orchestra for over a decade, including back in 2017, performing in Krzysztof Penderecki’s Concerto Grosso for Three Cellos and Orchestra. Yet he does not appear as a soloist frequently. 

Petr Vokáč has garnered numerous international accolades. He has won first prizes at the Cello Competition in Liezen, the Dotzauer Competition in Dresden, the Bohuslav Martinů Competition in Prague and the Leoš Janáček Competition in Brno. In 2006, he and the violinist Jakub Junek became overall winners at Concertino Praga; in 2012, he advanced to the semi-final of the Prague Spring Competition, thus being the most successful Czech participant. Moreover, he has received awards as a chamber player, including in the Johannes Brahms Wettbewerb in Pörtschach, first as a member of Taras Piano Trio and later with Lobkowicz Trio, which whom he has performed up to the present day. The latter ensemble, made up of Ivan Vokáč, Jan Mráček and Lukáš Klánský, has also won the 2017 Czech Chamber Music Society Award. 

His repertoire is wide-ranging, encompassing several genres. “The classical music performance principles can be perfectly applied in rock, jazz, popular and film music,” says the young cellist. He has closely collaborated with the Cello Republic ensemble (formerly Prague Cello Quartet), who present in concert their own arrangements of classical pieces, as well as non-classical music, enthralling audiences in the Czech Republic and beyond, including within regular tours of Japan. What’s more, Ivan Vokáč plays the piano with Escualo Quintet, focused on authentic performance of Argentine tango. 

Vokáč studied the cello and the piano. Whereas he reserved the former for classical music, the latter satisfied his passion for jazz. Yet neither of the two instruments kindled his early love of music. “As a child, I was fascinated by the double-bass, so much so that whenever it appeared on TV, I’d stand a metre away from the screen and stare spellbound. And when I then got a violin, I would never place it beneath my neck, but lean the instrument against the bed and play it the way the double-bass is played. But try giving a double-bass to a four-year-old boy…,” Vokáč recalls. He would replace the violin with the cello, which he believed would ultimately lead him to the double-bass, yet that would not come to pass. Vokáč would remain faithful to the cello. After taking private lessons from Oldřich Kavale, he studied the instrument at the Prague Conservatory and the Academy of Performing Arts (under the guidance of Miroslav Petráš), and he also attended masterclasses given by renowned cellists (Steven Isserlis, Boris Pergamenshikov, etc.). Ivan Vokáč was subsequently invited to festivals at home and abroad, began working with Czech Radio and Czech Television, before being engaged at the Czech Philharmonic.