Prague Sounds 2024

'Prague Sounds' respect the past, live in the present and look to the future. This constant evolution is the recipe that keeps the festival evolving. Just like good music.

The Prague Sounds festival, formerly known as Strings of Autumn, takes place this year from 3 to November 20, 2024. At ten concerts, he will bring big world names of jazz, contemporary vocal music, electronics, alternative hip-hop and world music bordering on classical, Czech premieres and unique one-off projects.

One of the greatest saxophonists of the last forty years and three-time Grammy winner, Branford Marsalis with his virtuoso quartet, London saxophonist Nubya Garcia or pianist Tigran Hamasyan connecting jazz with Armenian folk music will come. Oneohtrix Point Never, an icon of the experimental electronic scene, will bring his enchanting audiovisual spectacle to Prague. American alternative rap with captivating voices and engaging lyrics will be represented by Moor Mother, Billy Woods and McKinley Dixon. South African cellist Abel Selaocoe and the British contemporary music ensemble Manchester Collective will offer an experience on the border between classical, jazz and African world music in the Czech premiere. Also for the first time in the Czech Republic, the pioneering American vocal group Roomful of Teeth will perform with the composition Partita for 8 Voices by the Pulitzer Prize-winning composer Caroline Shaw.

Prague Sounds also comes with two new original festival projects - singers David Koller and Richard Müller will pay tribute to Karl Kryl in a one-off concert at Rudolfinum. For the first time, there will also be a curated evening with exceptional young Czech and Slovak talents. This year, the Slovak couple Lash & Gray and the Czech singers Nika and Johanela will play on it, selected by the artist Katarzie.

For more than 25 years of its existence, the Prague Sounds festival has established itself as one of the most important of musical events in the Czech Republic, whose broad and eclectic program sheds light on the relationships between genres from contemporary classical music to jazz, hip-hop, electronica and song projects. Prague Sounds introduced a number of iconic musical personalities of world importance, but it also systematically presents a new generation of artists who were inspired by them - often in Czech premieres.

The festival that was born as Struny Podzimu under President Václav Havel, offers a bold program of multi-genre concerts in the premises of the entire castle complex. Avant-garde jazz pianist Cecil Taylor, minimalist Michael Nyman, saxophonist Jan Garbarek in collaboration with the Hilliard Ensemble, and violinist Gidon Kremer indelibly wrote into the festival's history with memorable concerts.

With the end of Havel's presidency, the festival had to move outside the walls to the city under the Castle. It uses some of the most iconic spaces in Prague and is building a reputation thanks to a varied and high-quality program and by bringing foreign artists to Prague who have never performed here before - among them, for example, the Kronos Quartet, jazz pianist Brad Mehldau or vocal magician Bobby McFerrin.< /p>

“One of the most innovative music projects in Prague.” – The New York Times

“A festival that offers musical experiments for which few dramaturgy find the courage." - Václav Havel