The year 2025 was once again a highly active and successful year for the Association of Friends of Musical Talents. We continued to discover, introduce, and promote new operatic talent, bringing promising young singers to the attention of both professionals and the wider public.

We are particularly pleased that we continue to fulfil the Association’s mission: organising concerts for young singers, supporting their education and professional development not only in vocal technique, but also in interpretation and stagecraft, and, finally, presenting them to the public. Working with talented young people is highly rewarding and inspiring for everyone involved and creates a mutually beneficial exchange of experience and energy. Their enthusiasm and passion for singing are qualities that can sometimes be lacking among more established opera stars. We are delighted that the project has now been running for eight years and, thanks to the generosity of our donors, is able to continue developing, expanding, and growing. We also greatly value the fact that the Association has gradually become a sort of artistic and social platform, bringing young singers and their mentors together in an informal environment where they can share experience and establish professional and personal connections.

In 2025, we continued our successful collaboration with the outstanding Polish baritone and renowned tutor Prof. Mariusz Kwiecień. He worked intensively with our students during four sessions throughout the year, each lasting three to four days. Each student also had the opportunity to consult him at any time on appropriate repertoire for competitions and important auditions. His work goes far beyond vocal technique. The students receive guidance in stage presentation, character and role interpretation, language preparation, the importance of professional PR and communication, and, finally, an understanding of the challenges and demands of an international singing career. We seek to maintain close communication not only with the young singers themselves, but also with their teachers and families. Teachers are present at the masterclasses and have the opportunity to consult with our lecturers on the appropriate development of young voices and possible further studies. Together, we have developed a comprehensive concept for the professional development of our young opera singers. Between the masterclasses, this work is continued by Zuzana Marková, Simona Šaturová, Ahmad Hedar, and outstanding teachers from Czech conservatoires, the Academy of Performing Arts in Prague (HAMU), and Janáček Academy of Music and Performing Arts (JAMU). All masterclasses are provided to the participating students free of charge and are funded entirely through contributions from our donors.

We also continued our cooperation with the Opera Studio of the Bavarian State Opera. Two of our participants made a particularly strong impression on the programme’s director, Tobias Truniger, and are now candidates for admission to the programme.

Throughout the year, a number of distinguished international artists shared their experiences of the beginnings of their careers and the challenges they had encountered with our students. These included Julie Roset and Anthony León, Juliana Grigoryan, Jonathan Tetelman—whom the students also accompanied in a particularly moving encore—Zuzana Marková, Petr Nekoranec, and others. Our active artistic collaborators also included conductors Marco Armiliato, Łukasz Borowicz and Rastislav Štúr, as well as pianists and répétiteurs Ahmad Hedar, Ladislava Kaspříková, Kateřina Ochmanová, Vincenzo Scalera and Michele D’Elia.

The Association’s art song programme, focusing on education and professional development in the field of song repertoire, is successfully led by Simona Šaturová. Like Zuzana Marková, she also participates in Mariusz Kwiecień’s masterclasses and provides ongoing consultations between sessions, including guidance on suitable repertoire and the scheduling of competitions and professional presentations. For young singers, participation in orchestral rehearsals for our “Stars” concerts is particularly valuable. It gives students the opportunity to experience first-hand how rehearsals with a professional orchestra work and to observe how singers communicate and collaborate with one another in an orchestral setting. We are also pleased that Association’s was able to present young singers in a number of smaller concerts throughout the year. Through programmes featuring popular and well-known opera hits, we continue to engage audiences and maintain interest in the art form of opera.

Among the most significant achievements of singers who have emerged from our talent development programme in 2025, we would particularly like to highlight Petr Nekoranec’s cover performance replacing Benjamin Bernheim as Faust in the staged production of Berlioz’s La Damnation de Faust at the Théâtre des Champs-Élysées in Paris. Other major achievements included his casting as the title role in Cavalli’s La Calisto with Ensemble Correspondance, conducted by Sébastien Daucé, followed by a tour of France, as well as his debut at Opera Queensland in Brisbane, Australia, as Don Ramiro in Rossini’s La Cenerentola. Lada Bočková made her debut as Anaï in a new production of Rossini’s Moïse et Pharaon at the National Moravian-Silesian Theatre in Ostrava, and made her debut at the South Bohemian Theatre in České Budějovice in G. S. Frid’s monodrama The Diary of Anne Frank. Ester Pavlů made her debut as Kundry in a new production of Wagner’s Parsifal at the State Opera Prague, receiving excellent reviews. Lukáš Bařák made his debut as Dara in a new production of Otakar Ostrčil’s opera Legend of Erin. In addition to these highlights, we are pleased to have continued presenting young singers under the Association’s banner in a range of smaller concerts. Through our popular “opera hits” programmes, we continue to attract audiences and foster lasting interest in opera.

The project is supported under the patronage of the Minister of Culture of the Czech Republic.