Tomáš Brauner - Conductor

BIOGRAPHY

Tomáš Brauner is Chief Conductor of the Prague Symphony Orchestra, a position he has held since 2020. Through his collaboration with several Czech orchestras, he occupies a key posi­tion in Czech musical life, which is rich in tradition. Brauner was Chief Conductor of the Pilsen Philharmonic Orchestra from 2013 to 2018 and held the same position at the Bohuslav Martinů Philharmonic Orchestra from 2018 to 2020. He has also been Principal Guest Conductor of the Czech Radio Symphony Orchestra in Prague since 2014.

Despite his broad repertoire, Tomáš Brauner enjoys focusing on the Czech repertoire, which he often presents during his orchestra's foreign tours. In the Czech Jubilee Year 2024, five important Czech composers were honoured: Dvořák, Smetana, Suk, Martinů and Janáček. To mark the occasion, Tomáš Brauner took the Prague Symphony Orchestra on a tour abroad, which included performances at the Prinzregententheater in Munich and the Grosses Festspielhaus in Salzburg. On three consecutive days, enthusiastic Austrian audiences were treated to three different programmes of works by the jubilarians, whose music combines classical-romantic music with Bohemian and Moravian folklore in very different ways.

An earlier tour with the Prague Symphony Orchestra in 2018 took him to Poland and Munich, among other places, where he was able to demonstrate his mastery of non-Czech repertoire to foreign audiences with Rachmaninov's Piano Concertos Nos. 2 and 3. With his orchestra, Tomáš Brauner has recorded Czech film music from the 1930s, Dvořák's Slavonic Dances and, most recently, Rachmaninov's Piano Concertos with pianist Lukáš Vondráček, as well as the almost legendary Music for Prague 1968 by the composer Karel Husa, written in response to the end of the Prague Spring and the invasion by Soviet troops.

Tomáš Brauner regularly works with leading symphony orchestras and opera houses, including the Czech Philharmonic Orchestra, the German Radio Philharmonic Orchestra, the Munich Symphony Orchestra, the Nuremberg Symphony Orchestra, the Slovak Philharmonic Orchestra, the South Westphalia Philharmonic Orchestra, the National Radio Orchestra of Ro­mania, the Moscow State Radio Orchestra, the Orchestra of Colours of Athens, the Prague Chamber Philharmonic Orchestra and many others.

Tomáš Brauner began his career as an opera conductor at the Josef Kajetán Tyl Theatre in Plzeň (Pilsen). He made his debut at the Prague State Opera in 2008 with Verdi's Otello, con­ducted Verdi's La Traviata at the National Theatre in Prague, and conducted a production of Janáček's Jenůfa at the renowned Palacio de Bellas Artes in Mexico City, to name just a few outstanding productions.

Tomáš Brauner is also a welcome guest at major international festivals such as the Prague Spring, Bad Kissingen and the Richard Strauss Festival in Garmisch-Partenkirchen. His re­cording of the complete works for cello by Bohuslav Martinů with cellist Petr Nouzovský for the label Dabringhaus and Grimm won the 2017 Classic Prague Award.

Tomáš Brauner was born in Prague in 1978. After graduating in conducting from the Academy of Performing Arts in his native city in 2005, he studied at the University of Music and Performing Arts in Vienna. Five years later he won the Dimitris Mitropoulos International Com­petition in Athens.

Status: September 2024