Ondřej Adámek
composer, conductor and performer
For Ondřej Adámek, sound engages the whole body. Voice, breath and gesture run through music in which intimacy can erupt into collective outbursts, and play turn into unease. His works explore the need to communicate, the obstacles to speech, memory and the relationship between the individual and the group.
Born in Prague in 1979, he studied composition in Prague and at the Paris Conservatoire. He now lives in Spain after many years in Berlin. His stays in Japan, India and Africa have nurtured an attentive engagement with other musical traditions: their timbres, gestures and structures become starting points for a personal musical language.
His work develops through close collaboration with performers. Together, they explore the possibilities of instruments and the nuances of the voice, from whisper to shout. He also created the Airmachine, an instrument made of tubes, valves and objects set in motion by air. With the vocal ensemble N.E.S.E.V.E.N., which he founded in 2018, he pursues this exploration between concert and theatre.
His collaborators include Magdalena Kožená, Isabelle Faust, Christian Tetzlaff, Simon Rattle, Quatuor Diotima and Ensemble Modern. As a conductor, he has directed Connection Impossible with Ensemble Modern, as well as his opera INES with the Gürzenich Orchestra and the Chorus of Cologne Opera.
Recent premieres include Between Five Columns, commissioned by the Berliner Philharmoniker and premiered in 2025, and Thin Ice, his second violin concerto, premiered in 2026 by Christian Tetzlaff with the Orchestre National de France. He is currently composing a third string quartet for Diotima and working on cantata projects for SWR and Radio France.