ABOUT

Czech-British conductor Lada Valešová brings the vast wealth of her professional experience as a music director, pianist, and a vocal and language coach to her conducting, uniting the various strands of her expertise and drawing on each facet of her musicianship. 

Lada Valešová © Frances Marshall

Czech / British conductor Lada Valešová is a 2023 Winner Off West End Award in Opera Ensemble for the enterprising production of Janáček’s Cunning Little Vixen with the Hampstead Garden Opera, a company with a long record of giving opportunities to young singers performing fully staged operas on the London scene.

She opened the 2022 season at Opera Holland Park with a new production of Eugene Onegin to a great critical acclaim, and previously conducted Le Nozze di Figaro as an Associate Conductor with the OHP Young Artists. Her credits include conducting a UK professional premiere of opera Svadba by Canadian/Serbian composer Ana Sokolović for the Waterperry Opera Festival and Eugene Onegin for Opera West Green House. Highlights of this season include conducting an opera double bill at the Royal Scottish Conservatoire, which included the UK premiere of the orchestral version of Four Sisters, an opera by prominent British composer Elena Langer. 

Lada was an Assistant Conductor to Oksana Lyniv on production of Tosca at the Royal Opera House, to Stuart Stratford at the Scottish Opera on the instrumental version of Janáček’s Diary of One Who Disappeared produced for the Lammermuir Festival, and assisted Sian Edwards on Tchaikovsky’s Iolanta for Opera Holland Park.

She is one of seven conductors on the prestigious Royal Philharmonic Society programme “Woman Conductors Gateshead 2022-23” in partnership with Sage Gateshead and Royal Northern Sinfonia, which gives participants a unique opportunity to spend dedicated time conducting this exceptional orchestra in a series of residencies. Lada is a grateful mentee of the Royal Opera House, RPS and NOS programmes for Women Conductors, one of only twelve conductors accepted into the first training course for woman conductors at the National Opera Studio, hosted by the Royal Philharmonic Society and the Royal Opera House. 

Lada brings the vast wealth of her professional experience as a music director, pianist, and a vocal and language coach to her conducting, uniting the various strands of her expertise and drawing on each facet of her musicianship. As a Music Director and pianist for The Diary of One Who Disappeared by Janáček/Annelies van Parys directed by Ivo van Hove for Muziektheater Transparant, she has led and performed the production on an international tour in venues including BAM New York, Beijing International Festival, the Lindbury Studio ROH, deSingel and Vlaamse Opera and Antwerp Muziekgebouw Amsterdam. As a soloist and chamber musician she has performed in festivals such as the Prague Spring, the Three Choirs Festival, Oxford Lieder Festival and in venues including the Wigmore Hall, Royal Festival Hall, and the Dvořák Hall, Rudofinum Prague.

Lada Valešová © Frances Marshall
Lada Valešová © Frances Marshall

She has curated programmes reflecting her musical interests, exploring connections between the various East and Middle European cultural heritages, and highlighting the voices of unjustly neglected or silenced composers. Her discography captures these explorations: the album Fata Morgana/ Song by Pavel Haas includes a World-Premiere of the chamber piece of the same title. Nominated for the BBC Music Magazine Award 2018 in Vocal and Choral category it was declared Europedisc Album of the Year 2017. Piano album Dumka presents an in-depth exploration of this uniquely Slavic musical form. Her debut solo disc Intimate Studies draws on connections between generations of Czech composers as teachers. The album Arion: The Voyage of the Slavic Soul with trailblazing soprano Natalya Romaniw, presenting the journey through Slavic Song, was named one of the “Best Albums of 2020” by the Sunday Times.

Preceding her move into conducting Lada Valešová has worked as a coach for the Royal Opera House, Covent Garden, Teatro Real, Madrid, Kungliga Operan, Stockholm, Staatsoper Hamburg, Norwegian National Opera, Oslo, New Zealand Opera, Opera Holland Park, Garsington Opera and Glyndebourne Festival Opera as well as with the BBC Symphony Chorus, LSO Chorus, Philharmonia Voices and the CBSO Chorus. 

Lada is greatly invested in passing on her knowledge and expertise to a young new generation of musicians and artists. She has a longstanding association with the Guildhall School of Music and Drama, starting first as a student and then as a member of the Vocal Faculty. Shortly before finishing her studies, she has been invited to establish the Russian Repertoire Song Class and later also Czech repertoire, which she continues to directed in various forms ever since. Lada also works with the young singers at the Royal Academy of Music where she holds a position of Opera Role Coach.

As a natural and engaging communicator whose background bridges a number of cultures, Lada is passionate about sharing music with the widest circle of the audiences delivered to the highest standard, transforming the existing pre-conceptions, bringing down the barriers and making the life-enhancing process of being part of the musical experience accessible to all.