The organizers strived for his participation for two years due to his full calendar. “I am really looking forward to experiencing the atmosphere I have heard so much about with my own eyes. I had heard about the festival and I of course knew Český Krumlov as a fabulous town,” the tenor said at the early-evening meeting with journalists. 

Kaufmann does not plan any special vocal preparation before Friday’s performance on the open air stage which was built in the local car park. This is how he answered one of the questions of the journalists. “It is more important for me to watch the weather and focus on clothing. Such a concert is a great opportunity to connect the unconventional setting with beautiful music into a unique experience,” said the tenor.

In the opening program of the festival Kaufmann will perform the roles of Des Grieux, Don Alvaro, Werther and Don José among others. “I cannot say which one of these characters is my favourite. It is important for a singer to be convincing; he must convince the audience that there is something from this character in him. It is difficult to change from one role to another in a few minutes at the concert, but when you succeed in doing so it is interesting also for the listeners who don’t usually go to see operas,” Jonas Kaufmann said in Prague today. While the guest of the Český Krumlov gala concert Korean soprano Soo Yeon Kim will offer Rusalka’s aria Song to the Moon in Czech, Kaufmann will not sing a Czech repertoire. In the past he performed Smetana’s opera The Bartered Bride but in German. Czech pronunciation is difficult for him. Therefore he does not expect to sing in Czech in the future, “It is different to sing in a language which you can speak and in a language in which you cannot react to unforeseen situations and you know only what your teacher taught you. I am also terrified of the fact that I would not understand different nuances of language, therefore singing in Czech is out of the question,” admitted the forty-five-year-old tenor in Prague today. “At the beginning I had most problems with my mother tongue. Sung German is different to spoken German,” he added.

Jonas Kaufmann performed for the last time in front of the Czech audience in April this year when he offered his chamber program of Franz Schubert’s songs Winter Journey accompanied by Helmut Deutsche at the Municipal House in Prague. On Friday he will perform in Český Krumlov with the accompaniment of the Prague Radio Symphony Orchestra under the baton of Jochen Rieder.