Marek Keprt

Marek Keprt (b. 7 June 1974, Olomouc) is a pianist, composer, teacher and musicologist. He has been studying music since his childhood. At the age of 8 he became a student of Herta Hanáková at the music school Iši Krejčího and then he continued his studies with Ladislav Pulchert at the music school Žerotín in Olomouc. He studied at the High school of Economics in Olomouc (1988-1992); however, he attended private music lessons with Pavel Čotek - the elementary music theory and composition (1986-1992) and Eduard Fišer - conducting (1992-1994).

During 1992-2000 he studied at Universität für Musik und darstellende Kunst in Vienna - composition (Iván Eröd a Dieter Kaufmann) and piano (Alexander Jenner a Carmen-Graf-Adnet). He also attended piano master classes in Vienna (Alexander Jenner, 1992 and Carmen Graf-Adnet, 2003), Lucerne (James Tocco, 1994), Budapest (Csaba Kiraly, 2000) and in Engelberg (Alexis Weissenberg, 2004).

He has been working as an assistant professor at the Department of Musicology at the Philosophical Faculty of the Palacký University in Olomouc since 2002. In 2008 he graduated with the doctoral thesis entitled Scriabin's Music in his Middle Period, Exemplified by the Composer's Poemas for Piano. He worked as a piano and music theory teacher at the Religious Conservatory in Opava (2002-2014). In 2013-2016 he studied at the postgraduate piano class at the Faculty of Arts at University of Ostrava (supervisor Ivo Kahánek), where he also taught music theory. In 2014 he became a director of the festival of contemporary music MusicOlomouc and in 2016 he founded the contemporary music ensemble Lichtzwang. He was a resident of Ostrava Days 2017 Institute and in 2018 he participated at "CEEC Composers Field Trip" in China.

Artistic and academic activities

Marek Keprt regularly gives recitals in the Czech Republic and other countries such as Austria, Switzerland, Netherlands and South Korea. He recorded compositions of Frédéric Chopin, Robert Schumann, Leoš Janáček, Alexander Scriabin, Tristan Murail as well as his own pieces for the Czech Radio. As a soloist, he collaborates with the Moravian Philharmonic Orchestra with which he performed concertos by Robert Schumann - a minor, op. 54 (1991), Franz Liszt - no. 2 A major (1995), Sergei Rachmaninoff - no. 2 c minor, op. 18 (1999), Alexander Scriabin - f sharp minor, op. 20 (2003), César Franck - Symphonic Variations (2002) and Marek Keprt - ČtverJho chořních dob for piano, soprano and orchestra (2013).

The range of his repertoire includes the pieces from the periods of Romanticism, the turn of the 19th/20th centuries and the second half of the 20th century to the compositions of contemporary authors particularly on the music of Scriabin, Takemitsu, Russian avatgarde of the first half of the 20th century (Lourie, Vyšněgradskij, Roslavec, Obuchov), French spectralism (Messiaen, Murail, Pesson) and his own compositions. 

He contributed with the papers on the topic of Alexander Scriabin at a few international conferences - Symposium Melos-Ethos in Bratislava (2007, 2009) and The Third International Congress CHOPIN 1810-2010 in Warsaw (2010). He also gave lectures on Scriabin and his work at universities and musical academies (AMU Praha 2008, VŠMU Bratislava 2008, Hochschule für Musik Dresden 2009, Universität Leipzig 2012, Universität Halle 2014, Uniwersytet Jagiellonski Krakow 2015).

Keprt was awarded by several prizes at the competition Generace Ostrava and The Alban Berg Foundation in Vienna for his work. His compositions were performed in the Czech Republic, in some other European countries and also in the U.S; by musicians and ensembles such as Patricia Kopatchinskaja, Christoph Berner, Moravian Philharmonic Orchestra, Ostravská banda, Koehne Quartett, Ensemble Mondrian, Auditiv Vokal and various others. The chamber opera Blumfeld - bachelor was premiered on 9 June 2003 together with his brother Michael Keprt´s opera Banks of Ganga in the National Theater in Prague. Keprt´s pieces also appear in music festivals - Wien Modern, Melos-Ethos Bratislava, MusicOlomouc, Hudební současnost and Ostravské Dny.