It’s Never Late to See the Light – Jatka78

A multidisciplinary performance blending music, acrobatics and dance, featuring original choreography by the Czech-Australian CZirkidz Dance Company set to music by composer Karel Havlíček & STRO.MY Ensemble.

The dancers perform to music from Karel Havlíček’s latest album, It’s Never Late to See the Light, whose atmospheric soundscape lends the choreography and acrobatics a unique sense of depth and energy. The result is a compelling artistic experience in which the expressive power of music meets the dynamics of movement.

CZirkidz Dance Company brings together performers from the Trutnov region, who devote themselves to the performing arts in their free time, and professional acrobats from Australia. The company grew out of the Australian-Czech circus school CZirkidz, which has successfully completed four semesters of training. Its productions have been presented at the Cirk-UFF and Letní Letná festivals, as well as at a variety of other artistic events. In collaboration with Karel Havlíček, the company has created a unique multidisciplinary project in which original music, performed live by an orchestra, is enriched by a performative layer of dance and acrobatics, delicately guided by a story of fragility and beauty.

Karel Havlíček is an acclaimed Czech composer and multi-instrumentalist based in Prague and Los Angeles. His versatile career spans film, television and commercial music, as well as music production.

His credits include the original scores for the American feature films Lion Ark and Carpe Noctem, along with high-profile projects such as the trailer for HBO’s The Penguin (from the Batman universe) and the HBO Europe original series Terapie and Mamon. He has received multiple Czech Lion Award nominations, including for the feature film Brothers (2024) and the television series Professor T (2018) and Mamon (2015). Before establishing himself as an independent composer, songwriter and producer, he was a member of the band Southpaw. He also composed all the signature themes for the Czech Television news channel ČT24. Alongside his work for film and television, Havlíček explores the deeper emotional and physiological effects of music. He composed the album Pregnancy Music for expectant mothers and their unborn children, recording a full orchestra and slowing its sound to its most delicate and atmospheric form to create a uniquely immersive listening experience.

After several years in Los Angeles, he now works from his acclaimed Kabelovna Studios in Prague. His debut solo album, Spoken (2020), was an intimate artistic statement that showcased not only his gifts as a composer but also his musicianship as a pianist and multi-instrumentalist. In 2024, he released It’s Never Late to See the Light, further developing his distinctive ability to blend classical, electronic and cinematic music into a cohesive musical language.

Karel Havlíček is not only a prolific composer but also an outstanding live performer. His concerts are immersive experiences in which he takes centre stage at the piano, seamlessly weaving together classical, electronic and film music with rich orchestral arrangements. Whether performing solo or with a full orchestra, his live performances captivate audiences with their emotional intensity. Among his most notable appearances was a concert with an eighty-piece orchestra at Prague’s O2 universum in 2023, attended by more than 3,000 people. This year he will present another major concert – the official launch of It’s Never Late to See the Light – featuring his latest work in a large-scale orchestral production.

Through his innovative and forward-thinking approach to composition, Havlíček continues to push the boundaries of contemporary music while leaving a distinctive mark on the worlds of film, television and live performance.

Spoken is an intimate yet cinematic album in which Havlíček combines contemporary piano writing with subtle electronic textures. Each composition tells its own story without a single word. Through melody, dynamics and space, the album creates a profound emotional experience. Spoken is at once a quiet reflection, a deeply personal statement and a musical meditation.

It’s Never Late to See the Light brings fragile hope and light even to the quietest and darkest moments. Building on his signature musical language, Havlíček expands it with greater textural richness, lush string writing and carefully shaped emotional development. The album unfolds as a musical journey towards inner peace—slow, sincere and deeply intimate.

STRO.MY Ensemble is an international music ensemble known for its innovative approach to classical music and its site-specific performances, which often incorporate visual and performative elements. The ensemble performs regularly both in the Czech Republic and internationally. Its most acclaimed projects include the premiere of the site-specific performance Concert for the Forest, a European tour as part of the 2024 Year of Czech Music, the world premiere of the opera Kafka’s Letter to His Father, commissioned by the National Theatre in Prague, and a concert at Prague’s O2 universum in autumn 2023.