Yesterday I went to a concert at St. George Basilica, “one of Prague’s most significant Romanesque monuments and the city’s second oldest church”. Two white stone steeples dominate the structure, the wider tower is called Adam, the narrower Eve. The Basilica is part of the Prague Castle Complex on St. George’s Square.
The interior contains the tomb of the Přemyslids, the royal dynasty which reigned in Bohemia, Moravia, and parts of Hungary, Austria, and Poland. It also has a museum, gallery, statues from the National Gallery, and a concert hall. The Basilica is somewhat overshadowed by its massive neighbor St. Vitus Cathedral, the largest and most important church in the Czech Republic.
It was a stormy Sunday but warm and cozy inside the small candlelight concert hall. Members of the Prague Royal Orchestra played works by Dvořák, Smetana, Schubert, Bizet, Mozart, Vivaldi, and others. The small orchestra of 6 musicians, a talented violin soloist plus a soprano, performed for an audience of about 100.
Appropriately, they opened the concert with excerpts from a favorite, Czech composer Smetana’s patriotic symphonic poem The Moldau. The outstanding performance was enhanced by excellent acoustics inside the Basilica.
The concert was uniquely a Prague experience – beautiful music performed in a medieval basilica with dramatic history, soaring ceilings, and striking Romanesque architecture.