The Slovak Radio Symphony Orchestra
was established in 1929 as the first professional symphony orchestra in Slovakia. The Czech conductor František Dyk was then appointed to be the official leader of the Orchestra. Over the years the Orchestra was led by many outstanding personalities as chief conductors or main conductors including K. Schimpl, F. Babušek, K. Baranović, Ľ. Rajter, R. Týnský, L. Slovák, B. Režucha, O. Lenárd, R. Stankovský, Ch. Olivieri Munroe and O. Dohnányi. The Orchestra is currently led by chief conductor Mario Košik. Since January 2015 Adrian Kokoš has cooperated with the Orchestra as the second conductor. In the past the ensemble has also successfully recorded for publishers such as Opus, Supraphon, Naxos, Marco Polo, Arte Nova and others. The Orchestra premiered many works of Slovak as well as foreign composers and often engages in recording music for movies. SOSR performs with renowned guest conductors such as Ch. Mackerras, N. Järvi, K. Trevor, A. Paris, F. Haider, A. Mogrelia, D. Porcelijn, V. Spivakov, P. Altrichter, Y. Kamdzhalov and others. Many excellent soloists from Slovakia and abroad have already performed with the Orchestra including Anna Netrebko, Yusif Eyvazov, Boris Berezovskij, Edita Gruberová, Adriana Kučerová, Štefan Kocán, Pavol Bršlík, Daniel Ottensamer, Dana Ciocarlie, Alena Baeva, Andrey Yaroshinsky, Jiří Bárta, Dalibor Karvay and others. The Orchestra regularly performs at music festivals in Slovakia such as the Bratislava Music Festival, New Slovak Music Festival, Melos-Ethos, Allegretto Žilina or Radio_Head Awards Festival. SOSR is also welcome at concert stages abroad and appeared as a guest for instance in Austria, Germany, Hungary, Spain or Japan. It performed several times at the prestigious Viennese Musikverein, in the Philharmonie in Essen, Cologne, Klagenfurt and others. In the years 2016 and 2017 SOSR participated in opera productions of the operas Love Drink and Rigoletto at the St. Margarethen Opera Festival staged in the St. Margarethen quarry. The Orchestra cooperated also in several “cross-over” projects such as the Korben Dallas Symphony. One of the important activities of SOSR includes for instance also the premiere recording of the opera by Ermanno Wolf-Ferrari: The Jewels of the Madonna (I gioielli della Madonna). The Slovak Radio Symphony Orchestra regularly cooperates with Slovak publishers in recording and presentation of works by Slovak composers mainly.