Štěpán Rak

The world-renowned music rewiever John Botton of New Zealand wrote about Štěpán Rak:
“In the world of classical guitar there are bad guitarists, average guitarists, good guitarists, excellent guitarists, and..Štěpán Rak!” Claiming credit for founding the guitar department in 1982 at the Academy of Music and Arts in Prague, Štěpán Rak was appointed in 2000 by the President of the Czech Republic as the first university-level professor ever to hold the title in this specialization. His five-finger technique he has been teaching around the world has become something of a legend, as has his “tremolo etherna”. His meeting professor Štěpán Urban has proved portentous as he was led to devote himself also to composition. His works cover almost all instrumental combinations from the solo guitar to a large symphony orchestra. The year 2005 will see Štěpán Rak marking the 60 th anniversary of his birth, among other things also by a composition paying tribute to his revered teacher and friend professor Štěpán Urban, founder of the guitar department at the State Conservatory in Prague, whose last wish that the guitar may be studied at a university-level, has thus been honoured. Intense musical experience, mastery, the composer-interpreter´s absolute identification with the spirit of the music performed, these are the main characteristics of Štěpán Rak´s musical expression. Among the most recent achievements of professor Štěpán Rak´s (1945) as composer and guitarist has been a successful participation at the 2004 World Guitar Masters Festival in California, USA, where he performed his concert-long suite for solo guitar entitled 20,000 Miles Under the Sea. In the same year he gave a successful performance in Beijing of his concert programme In Praise of Tea. For many years he has been cooperating with Alfred Strejček, also as part of the Castle Festival of Music and Literature at a castle near Jičín. Last year he made his guitar sound like a bagpipe orchestra at the International Bagpipes Festival in Strakonice. He has toured the American continent with his project Vivat Comenius paying tribute to the great Czech teacher and philosopher, has often been invited to play in Moscow, gives master classes, seminars and courses of guitar-therapy which too have met with tremendous response.