Czech Philharmonic • Bucharest

One of the most inspiring young Czech conductors, since the beginning of the 2024/25 season Petr Popelka has been music director of the Wiener Symphoniker. Previously holding the post of principal conductor of the Norwegian Radio Orchestra, he continues to be music director of the Prague Radio Symphony Orchestra. 

Popelka started his artistic career as a double-bassist. Following his studies in Prague and Freiburg, he was engaged at the Staatskapelle Dresden, where he would serve as deputy solo double-bassist for almost a decade. While still a student, he developed a keen interest in conducting, and also composed music. In addition to taking private lessons, he closely observed conductors in action. “Every day with the orchestra was actually like a small masterclass for me,” Popelka said. In 2016, he arrived at the decision to learn conducting in earnest, and duly began studying with Vladimir Kiradjiev, and attending classes led by Alan Gilbert and others. Soon after receiving the Neeme Järvi Prize at the Gstaad Conducting Academy, he was named assistant to Gilbert, chief conductor of the NDR Elbphilharmonie Orchester. A year later, in 2020, Popelka was appointed principal conductor of the Norwegian Radio Orchestra, while also performing with the Gewandhausorchester, Staatskapelle Berlin, Bamberger Symphoniker, Atlanta Symphony Orchestra and others. Amid his growing international reputation, Popelka was named main visiting conductor of the Janáček Philharmonic Ostrava and also invited to work with the Czech Philharmonic. In September 2022, he assumed the post of principal conductor of the Prague Radio Symphony Orchestra. One of the highlights of the 2022/23 season was a concert in Prague Popelka conducted of Arnold Schönberg’s monumental cantata Gurre-Lieder, performed by the Norwegian Radio Orchestra and the Prague Radio Orchestra. 

Besides giving concerts, he has conducted opera productions, including at the Norwegian National Opera in Oslo, the Semperoper in Dresden and the National Theatre in Prague. Popelka also continues to play the double-bass, appearing occasionally at chamber music performances. 

A graduate of the Moscow Conservatory, Sergei Vasilyevich Rachmaninoff created mostly in the 20^th century, but his music – influenced mainly by Pyotr Ilyich Tchaikovsky – remains firmly rooted in the late Romantic style. Rachmaninoff himself commented on this: “I cannot cast out the old way of writing and I cannot acquire the new. I have made an intense effort to feel the musical manner of today, but it will not come to me.” Although he composed three operas, an equal number of symphonies, several sacred works, and a number of remarkable songs, he is best known for his piano works, which include four concertos and a number of solo pieces. Rachmaninoff, himself an accomplished pianist, performed with success not only in his homeland but also in Europe and on the American continent. He was also active as a conductor, first in Moscow, where he conducted operas by Glinka and Tchaikovsky at the Bolshoi Theatre, then in Dresden from 1906 to 1909, before making his first major concert tour to the United States. Rachmaninoff did not accept the regime established after the Great October Socialist Revolution in 1917, and soon afterwards left his homeland permanently. He first lived in Europe and in 1935 settled in the United States, where he developed a rich concert career and continued to compose. Although he privately and publicly criticized the Soviet regime, he bore the separation from Russia very hard; his family maintained Russian customs, surrounded themselves with Russian friends, and hired Russian servants. In exile, Rachmaninoff was an ardent patriot, which was especially evident after the invasion of the Soviet Union by Nazi Germany, when he donated his concert fees to support the Red Army. He died in California just four days before his 70^th birthday.

His very last composition is Symphonic Dances, Op. 45, composed in 1940. Rachmaninoff gave the individual movements of this three-movement work titles seemingly indicating the times of day (Noon – Twilight – Midnight), but in reality it is probably a metaphor related to the stocktaking at the end of his life, when he was already very ill. Rachmaninoff’s Symphonic Dances, whose instrumental embellishments include the use of the alto saxophone as a solo instrument in the first movement, have been choreographed for ballet on several occasions, but more often they are performed as a stand-alone symphonic piece that can make an emotional impact in its own right.