Jiří Kout

Jiří Kout (1937) is at present one of the internationally most renowned Czech conductors. He studied at the Academy of Performing Arts in Prague. His career as a conductor started in 1964 in Pilsen. Only a year later, he drew attention as laureate of the International Conducting Competition in Besançon.

In 1969 Jiří Kout was forced to leave Pilsen, as he publicly protested against the invasion of Czechoslovakia by Warsaw Pact soldiers in August 1968. He was allowed to work more systematically again in 1972, when he took up the post of Conductor at the National Theatre in Prague. At the same time, he was under unceasing pressure because of his anticommunist thinking. After a series of successful guest appearances at the Deutsche Oper am Rhein in Düsseldorf, he finally decided to go into exile, and became Permanent Conductor at the Düsseldorf Opera. In 1985 he became Music Director of the Saarbrücken Opera. In 1990, he was appointed Principal Conductor of the Deutsche Oper in Berlin and, in addition to that, in 1993 he became Music Director of the Leipzig Opera.

Jiří Kout has won international fame particularly as an excellent conductor of the works of Wagner, Strauss and Janáček whose operas he has conducted at the most prestigious opera houses around the world. In Berlin, Janáček’s opera Katya Kabanova under his direction was awarded as the best production of the year. In 1998 Jiří Kout became Chief Conductor of the St. Gallen Symphony Orchestra, where he now lives with his family. From the 2006/2007 concert season on, he has been holding the position of Chief Conductor of the Prague Symphony Orchestra.

The audience in Prague had the first oppurtunity to see him conducting – after many years spent in exile – as late as 1992, when he conducted Bruckner´s Symphony No. 8 with Czech Philharmonic Orchestra. Kout later on conducted many other highly successful performances in National Theatre, for instance Janáček’s Jenufa in 2005/2006. Jiří Kout also regularly appears with the Czech Philharmonic Orchestra, as well as with the Prague Symphony Orchestra with whom he performed Smetana’s My Country at the opening concert of the Prague Spring Music Festival in 2004.

Jiří Kout received the Ministry of Culture Prize for contributions in the field of music for the year 2007. 

In October 2007, on the 80th anniversary of the establishment of Czechoslovakia, Jiří Kout received a medal for services to the state in the field of culture and art from the president of the Czech Republic Václav Klaus.