Several words about the choir
The choir Mladost was established as a children choir by PHDr. Jaroslav Dostalík in the year 1956. During the next fifteen years the choir worked its way up aminy the top European children choirs. It was very successful and won eminent places in children choirs competitions and festivals. After Jaroslav Dostalík had left the choir it existed for next seven years and was conducted by several conductors till the year 1978.
Since the year 1996 the former members of the children choir started to meet again to follow up with the singing activity as the mixed choir and with the conductor Jaroslav Dostalík again. The choir kept its original name Mladost extended with an abbreviation PPS which means original singing choir.
Since 2002 the activity of the choir has been regular and the choir has taken part in concerts and festivals all over the country. The choir has been registered as Civic Association PPS Mladost by Home Office and it has been a member of the Czech Choirs Association.
There are seven members in the committee which organizes all activities. Věra Vyskočilová is the chairwoman.
From 2002 to 2004 the conductor of the choir was MgA. Jitka Čudlá and in summer 2004 BcA. Katarína Mašlejová became the conductor. They both passed their studies in Janáček´s Academy of Arts in Brno. Along with the coming of these two young but professionally very advanced conductors the artistic level of the choir rose a lot. Especially thanks to Katarína Mašlejová´s demanding but kind and gracious conducting the singers´ enthusiasm and creation grew up. The choir realized its first successful tours abroad to Luxemburg, Slovakia and Italy.
MgA. Jarmila Jalůvková, a student at first and later the graduate of Janáček´s Academy of Arts,started her conducting of the choir in September 2007. PPS Mladost performed in international music festivals in Europe – in October 2008 in Lago di Garda Music Festival in Italy, in October 2009 in Cracovia Music Festival in Poland and in May 2010 in Europadag Mondercange in Luxemburg.
The choir was successful in international music competitions, too. In Praga Cantat 2010 it was awarded the silver prize in two categories- female choirs and folk songs- and the conductor Jarmila Jalůvková won the special prize of the jury for the best conductor.
The choir repeated its success in Slovakia Cantat 2011 in Bratislava and it won the silver prize in the same categories again. Mladost reached the highest laurel- the gold prize- in the international festival of contemporary choir music Canti Veris Praga 2012.
MgA. Jarmila Jalůvková was awarded for her artistic work by the Czech Choirs Association in 2014. She obtained the national choir appraisal for young conductors Conductor - Junior. Unfortunately she had to leave the choir for the family reasons.
Since November 2014 Stanislav Smoček, a student of Janáček´s Academy of Arts and graduated organist, has become a new conductor of the choir.
For want of male voices the choir changed to female choir in January 2010.
The repertoire of the choir includes sacred and secular compositions, vocal polyphonies by old masters ( Orlando di Lasso, Giovanni Ottavio Pitoni ), compositions by Czech and world Composers of classical music ( Felix Mendelssohn Bartholdy, Wolfgang Amadeus Mozart, Robert Schumann, Bedrich Smetana, Antonin Dvorak ), compositions by contemporary Czech composers ( Petr Eben, Zdenek Lukas ). We also sing Negro spirituals and folk songs from our and foreign countries. We can provide concerts and performances for different occasions with regard to our various repertoire.
In October 2016 Mladost won two silver bands in categories women choirs and sacred music in the 30th Praga Cantat International Choirs Competition.
