R4 / Written for the Prague Radio Symphony: Martin Smolka • Prague Radio Symphony Orchestra

The Prague Radio Symphony Orchestra regularly commissions works by contemporary composers and performs them in world premieres. The first such venture for chief conductor Petr Popelka will be the staging of a new composition for piano and orchestra by Martin Smolka, whose works are performed by leading European orchestras, including the Bavarian Radio Symphony Orchestra. The soloist is Nicolas Hodges, one of the best pianists specialising in contemporary music. The programme opens with a playful symphony full of surprising twists and turns, in the third movement of which Joseph Haydn also prescribed the orchestra's tuning. The evening will conclude with one of Richard Strauss's supreme symphonic poems, Symphonia domestica, the composer's intimate reflection on family life.

The project has been made possible thanks to financial support from the City of Prague. Prague