After Seoul success Czech musicians set for Gumi performance

The musicians of the PRSO have a series of three successful performances in the South Korean capital Seoul behind them. On the last day of May and the first day of June our musicians, under conductor Petr Vronský, performed at the Sejong Center, one of the two most important venues in the city. The audience in the spectacularly constructed hall, with a capacity of over 3,000, enjoyed Smetana’s Vltava, Dvořák’s Eighth Symphony, Tchaikovsky’s Symphony No. 5 in E Minor, and two piano concertos: Beethoven’s Fifth in E-flat Major (the “Emperor Concerto”), and Rachmaninoff‘s concerto No. 2 in C Minor, both performed by the Russian soloist Konstantin Shcherbakov.

While the first concert at the Sejong Center was attended by the Czech ambassador to South Korea, Jaroslav Olša, Wednesday’s performance was broadcast live by the public service radio station KBS and on SEN TV. The evening reached a crescendo with an endless ovation from joyous audience members during encores in the form of Dvořák’s Slavonic Dances no. 10 and no. 15.

The Seoul part of the PRSO’s tour ended on Thursday with a performance at the cultural centre in Seoul’s biggest autonomous district, Nowon-gu. Today the musicians moves on to the city of Gumi in the eastern part of South Korea, where with their fifth concert the orchestra’s tour of the country finishes. Again under the baton of conductor Vronský, the PRSO will perform the overture to Mozart’s the Marriage of Figaro, Smetana’s Vltava, Tchaikovsky’s Romeo and Juliet Fantasy-Overture, and the aforementioned fifth Beethoven concerto with Konstantin Shcherbakov on piano. At the weekend the musicians will make the long journey home.