Jan Ondráček

Tenor Jan Ondráček was born in Bernburg, Germany. He studied at the Prague Conservatory, and then privately. After early engagements with the Southern Bohemia Theatre in České Budějovice (Mozart, Die Zauberflöte; Carl Zeller, Der Vogelhändler), he made his debut at the National Theatre in Prague (Mozart, Le nozze di Figaro; Smetana, The Bartered Bride), and subsequently at the J. K. Tyl Theatre in Plzeň (Bellini, I Capuletti e i Montecchi; Wagner, Der fliegende Holländer). His first appearance on the stage of the Prague State Opera, as Peter Quint in Britten’s The Turn of the Screw, has been followed by an extensive gallery of creations, including the roles of Monostatos, Remendado, Goro, Chekalinsky, and Zsupan. He has worked with the conductors Hilary Griffiths, Heiko Mathias Förster, Bohumil Gregor and Ondrej Lenárd, and with the stage directors Arnaud Bernard, Jiří Nekvasil, Jiří Heřman and David Pountney. He was involved in Mozart productions mounted by the Original Music Theatre Prague, as Don Ottavio (2009), and Tamino (2011). As an oratorio singer, he has built up a repertoire encompassing Mozart’s Masses, Gounod’s Messe solennelle en l’honneur de Sainte Cécile, Dvořák’s Stabat Mater (in which he sang at Charles University’s gala concert in the Carolinum, Prague, in 2010), or Janáček’s Our Father. He is likewise a keen interpreter of songs. Jan Ondráček has toured in Germany, Switzerland, and Japan.