Anděl award winners Vladimír Mišík, Beata Hlavenková, Zvíře jménem Podzim, Mirai, Hugo Toxxx, Vertigo, Ivo Kahánek and the Bamberg Symphony Orchestra
This week’s Sunday Music Show features winners of the Czech music industry’s annual Anděl awards. Leading the pack is singer-songwriter Vladimír Mišík, who won in the categories of best male singer, best album, and rock and folk genres. The best female singer award went to Beata Hlavenková, a composer, pianist, and producer who also works as a music teacher. The Discovery of the Year award went to music project Zvíře jménem Podzim (An Animal Named Autumn), whose latest LP Září (September) also won in the Alternative and Electronic category. Then there’s the pop group Mirai (which in Japanese means ‘Future’), named best Band, thanks to their second studio album, Arigatō. Winning in the Rap category was Hugo Toxxx, with his LP called 1000, and in the Jazz category, Vertigo, with their album Daleko, and in the Classical category, Ivo Kahánek and the Bamberg Symphony Orchestra.
Vladimír Mišík, who turned 73 in May, founded his first band, Uragán, when still in his teens. He has been a prominent figure on the Czech rock and folk music scene virtually ever since, starting as a member of influential bands The Matadors and later Blue Effect, which was inducted into the Beat Hall of Fame. Mišík has since the eighties been associated mainly with the band Etc… The LP ‘Jednou tě potkám’ (I’ll meet you one day), voted album of the year on Saturday, was his first solo recording in over four decades.
The music project called Zvíře jménem Podzim (An Animal Named Autumn) is the brainchild of Jakub König, who also goes by the name Kittchen. However, on Září, their second LP, the project have expanded to become a veritable orchestra. Září combine beats, strings, atmospheric detail, great vocals and lyrics crammed with references to nature, animals and decay.
Mirai, winners of this year’s Anděl award for best Band, are named after frontman Mirai Navrátil, a singer-guitarist with Japanese roots from the town of Frýdek-Místek. This is their second Anděl award, and they also have a Český slavík to their credit.
Beata Hlavenková taught composition at the famous Jaroslav Ježek Conservatory and is currently teaching at New York University in Prague. She has a distinct cross-genre sound, resplendent with unconventional harmonies and arrangements, rooting in her deep knowledge of jazz, modern classical music, pop and indie folk.
Hugo Toxxx, whose real name Jan Danek, is a prominent Czech rapper, producer, and former member of the Movement Bigg Boss, the main figure of the Prague Hypno label 808, and of hip-hop formation Supercrooo. He previously won the Apollo award for the Album of the Year.
Czech pianist Ivo Kahánek and the Bamberg Symphony Orchestra had previously received the highly acclaimed BBC Music Magazine’s Concerto Award for 2020. Their CD featuring the piano concertos of Antonín Dvořák and Bohuslav Martinů, conducted by Jakub Hrůša, won the Anděl award in the classical music category.
