It’s spring in Prague every year / It’s the Prague Spring every year, opus 1.

Someone has to stand in front of the viola, behind the viola, I want to start playing now. A peep under the skirt of classical music with Pavel Koutecký’s film crew.

 Sex, faith, children, the poetry of ordinary things and the voices of angels. Or, put another way: the orchestra as a big circus, conducting as provoking people to the very edge, the solo as communication with a partner. Or put yet another way: seeking a link with the past, the endeavour to achieve (elusive) perfection, the struggle with unforeseen obstacles.

What is a music festival: Ladies in front of their dressing-table mirror? The feeling that you were (together with others) actually there? The concentration of exceptional people and exceptional feats? An opportunity for discovery, for experiences, for encounters?

Something noble yet languishing on the fringes of society’s interest? The culmination of long-term, difficult work? 

'It’s spring in Prague every year' is a project which dismantles the stereotypes associated with the presentation of so-called serious music in the media. A certain rigidity, tedium and overwrought officialdom create a barrier between this sphere and the general public.

Opus No. 1 consists of two principal lines and two secondary themes. Encounter – two clarinetists. A Czech and Israeli clarinetist rehearse a double concerto. First, they sing it to each other down the telephone and email photos of the dresses ... Then they get together and discover that each has been practising a different version of the work.

Oratorio – Conductor, soloists and the others. Getting ready to perform Dvořák’s St Ludmila, from the soloists’ piano rehearsals through to the full rehearsal. We have the fulfilment of the conductor’s vision right before our eyes – and our ears.

BBC orchestra – moving the circus. What does it mean to shift a full orchestra from one place to the next, and what is it like to play every day in a different concert hall and sleep in a different bed.

Ebony Orchestra – civility, peculiarity, obscenity…? In a contrapuntal blend with the stately oratorio, we are given three chapters about a concert held in honour of E.F. Burian.