EMBASSY OF THE CZECH REPUBLIC
Tuesday, November 22, 2022 7:00PM
Struggle for Freedom and Democracy Day is a public holiday celebrated in the Czech Republic and Slovakia on November 17. It commemorates two historical events that occurred on this day: the student demonstration against Nazis in 1939 and the beginning of the Velvet Revolution in 1989.
On November 17, 1989, nine days after the fall of the Berlin Wall roughly 200 miles to the north, students gather en masse in Prague, Czechoslovakia to protest the communist regime. The demonstration sets off what will become known as the Velvet Revolution, the non-violent toppling of the Czechoslovak government and one of a series of anti-communist revolutions that marked the late 1980s and early ’90s. Czechoslovakia (Czech Republic) is one of the few countries during the 20th century whose nation magnified the acts of bravery and defiance against authoritarianism, communism and Nazism. Tonight’s concert we will celebrate this nation with several Czech and one Russian composer who were deeply connected to the following events that led to the freedom of a people throughout the span of an entire century:
1918 Revolt of the Czechoslovak Legion
1939 (17 November) Anti Nazi Protest from Czech Students
1968 Prague Spring (Soviet Invasion!)
1989 Velvet Revolution and Berlin Wall
1993 Dissolution of Czechoslovakia
An extraordinary event with music by Bedřich Smetana, Antonín Dvořák, Leoš Janáček, Bohuslav Martinů, and Dmitry Shostakovich performed by the Serafin Ensemble!
Eric Pritchard, violin (Original Member of the Alexander String Quartet
Jacques-Pierre Malan, cello (Artist in Residence Embassy Series)
Read Gainsford, piano (faculty at Florida State University College of Music)
$100 Includes wine, heavy hors-d’œuvres
. Easy on street parking.
Program: Smetana, Janáĉek, Martinů, Shostakovich, Dvořák