The European Medical Students’ Orchestra and Choir, short “EMSOC”, is an international charity and musical project that has been connecting medical students and young doctors from all over Europe for over 30 years now.
Each year, over 100 selected participants come together to prepare a musical programme for symphonic orchestra and choir under the leadership of two professional conductor and perform for an audience in two charity concerts - the profits of which goes to local organisations supporting people in need.
The project is traditionally organised by a group of volunteers from the current hosting country, in the last years that having been for example Spain (Granada), Germany (Lübeck), Sweden (Uppsala), and the Portuguese Azores (Ponta Delgada).
This year's EMSOC will be held from the 25th of July to the 4th of August 2024 in the Czech Republic.
The project will be dedicated to the Year of Czech Music and the 200th anniversary of the birth of the Czech composer Bedřich Smetana. That is also one of the reasons why we have decided to hold the rehearsal week in Litomyšl, a town that is not only part of the UNESCO World Heritage but also birthplace to this famous composer.
Apart from the musical side of the project, participants can once again expect an abundant free-time programme that will introduce them to the Czech Republic and its rich history and culture. They will get to see Unesco World Heritage sites in Litomyšl, Prague and Kutná Hora, experience our country's traditions through music and dance, taste the local cuisine and, most importantly, forge new friendships and deepen old ones in the unique EMSOC atmosphere.
Join us for this 10-day gathering in the Czech Republic to share and create unforgettable and unique memories. For more info, follow us on social media!
We are delighted to announce that this year’s first official concert will take place in the Cathedral of St Barbara in Kutná Hora on the 02. 08. 2024 at 7pm. Built in the late Gothic period, the Cathedral, which dominates the city’s silhouette, is inscribed on the Unesco World Heritage List and is a popular tourist destination for visitors from all over the world, who come to admire its splendid architecture that echoes the town’s former wealth and fame.
The second and final concert, will be held in the capital city of Prague, in the historic Bethlehem Chapel on the 03. 08. 2024 at 6pm. The chapel, which was founded in 1392 during the Czech reformation as a place for sermons to be held in Czech, instead of the predominant German of the time, has seen many important figures inside its walls, including the reformer Jan Hus, who became the inspiration for the protestant Hussite movement. Located in the very heart of the Old Town, its halls today serve as a ceremonial space for the Czech Technical University, as well as a unique concert space.
In addition to the two concerts, a public general rehearsal will also take place in the space of the former castle riding hall in Litomyšl on the 1st of August.
The diverse musical programme will range from Czech romanticism to the second half of the 20th century, and include the best that Czech Music has to offer including A. Dvořák, B. Smetana, V. Kaprálová, V. Novák, Z. Lukáš and others.
This year's EMSOC is being organised by a group of young doctors and good friends, who have participated in this project for many years and can't quite imagine life without it now. This project, which brings together such a diverse group of people, who nevertheless share a love for both music and medicine, has enchanted and inspired them and gifted them with wonderful experiences. So they would like to finally return the favour, and give back to the project by organising an unforgettable 10 days in the Czech Republic, during which they hope to pass on the same cherished experiences and memories to the current participants.
Apart from their profession, the members of the organising committee are also enthusiastic amateur musicians active in different musical groups throughout the Czech Republic. Let's have them quickly introduce themselves in their own words!
This is Richard. Richard likes music and also medicine - mostly trombone and neurology that is. Perhaps you might think this a strange combination but, as he puts it, there is a buyer for all kinds of goods, after all. It was EMSOC that, after the exhausting first years of medicine, brought Richard back to a dusty instrument case and made him start to very loudly play his trombone again! And he didn't stop until he found a whole heap of great friends from all over Europe who, as he realised, were feeling the same way as him. How beautiful!
Right now Kristýna is already working as a doctor, but she was lucky enough to discover EMSOC already during her first year of medicine. From that time on, she cannot imagine a better way to spend the summer and believes it to be one of the best things that life has sent her way. It has enriched her not only as a violinist, but also as a physician and enthusiastic traveller and has brought many people into her life that have since become her friends for life. All of this was a huge motivation for her, when together with her friends she decided to take on this project for 2024 and organise it in the Czech Republic.
Katka is professionally working in the infectious disease department and, unprofessionally, often found singing - often in a choir, and even more often in the kitchen. She experienced EMSOC for the first time in 2019 in Granada, where she realised that the project’s atmosphere was even more contagious than her medical specialty, and that she had to come back the next year. And the next. And so she has been coming back to a different corner of Europe every year, not only for the music and the different countries and cultures but also for the friends she can no longer imagine her life without.
Katka is working in her 5th year in the internal medicine department in a regional hospital. The work can be exhausting at times, but since her childhood the best relaxation for her has always been music. After many years, it was EMSOC that brought her back to singing in a choir, and showed her the most enthusiastic group of people that you could imagine. One such “musical holiday” means motivation and a blast of energy for the whole next year, and that’s something you want to experience over and over again.
When Jan grows up, he wants to be an internal medicine doctor. Apart from that, he’s an enthusiastic singer, who won’t hear a bad word against the Doubravan choir in his hometown Chotěboř, but also enjoys singing in the Kühn Choir in Prague, or with friends around the campfire. With fondness he remembers the music school in Chotěboř, and from time to time he will also play the saxophone. Through EMSOC he finally found friends, who love music as much as he does, and spend their days buried in music sheets as well as medical textbooks.
The professional musical guidance of this year's EMSOC in the Czech Republic will be provided by a young pair of talented conductors: Tomáš Stanček and Jakub Pikla.
Tomáš graduated from the Janáček Conservatory in Ostrava in the conducting class of Jaromir Javůrka and later went on to study at the Academy of Performing Arts in Prague. During his professional career he has worked with a variety of Czech orchestras, such as the Janáček Philharmonic Orchestra Ostrava, the PKF Prague Philharmonia or the Moravian Philharmonic Olomouc, and also the Silesian Theatre in Opava, and has taken part in a number of conducting seminars throughout the country. In 2016 he made his debut at the International Music festival Janáčkův máj and became the permanent conductor for the winner’s concert of the International Young Composer’s Competition Generace. As well as working with orchestras, he also has an interest in choral music. From 2018 on, he is a member of the National Information and Advising Centre for Culture and Amateur Artistic Activities’ committee for middle school choir music. He regularly takes part in choir seminars as lecturer and repetiteur, and leads a number of vocal ensembles at the Janáček Conservatory, where he is also the conductor of the opera studio.
Jakub studied conducting at the conservatory in Pardubice and later moved on to graduate from the Academy of Performing Arts in Prague, where he studied orchestral, choral, and opera conducting and music direction. During his studies, he spent time abroad at the Kungliga Musikhögskolan in Stockholm and, back in the Czech Republic, has been at the head of multiple choirs, performing at both domestic and international concerts. In 2022, he became choirmaster of the Kühn Choir of Prague, one of the largest and most acclaimed of the country, through which he regularly works in close collaboration with institutions and notable ensembles, such as the Czech National Opera or the FOK Prague Symphony Orchestra. Having already been in the audience of multiple EMSOC concerts in the past, we are thrilled to have him join in on this year’s programme as choir director.
We are very happy to be able to work together with the non-profit organisation ALSA z.s., to which the revenue of the concerts’ voluntary entrance fees and other contributions will be donated.
We are very happy to be able to work together with the non-profit organisation ALSA z.s., to which the revenue of the concerts’ voluntary entrance fees and other contributions will be donated. ALSA supports people suffering from ALS (amyotrophic lateral sclerosis)- a neurological disease that causes the degeneration of cells controlling the body’s muscles. Patients with this condition gradually lose the ability to move parts of their bodies, until eventually only eye movement remains possible, all while remaining alert and retaining all of their mental capacity. As the only organisation of its kind in the Czech Republic and Slovakia, ALSA works to connect those suffering from ALS with professionals working in the field, organises educational campaigns and fundraisers in support of their clients, and provides individual support in the form of home consultations, the renting out of mobility aids and equipment, financial support and more. Their biggest objective is to one day open a specialised centre for patients with ALS, the likes of which already exist in other countries, and we hope that together, we can bring them at least a little bit closer to achieving that goal.
For more information you can have a look at their website at: https://www.zsalsa.cz/en
Would you like to support us?
The whole project is organised by a group of volunteers and financed solely by participation fees, grants, and donations of generous sponsors - one of which could be you! Your support will enable us to cover expenditures such as transportation, the cost of purchasing sheet music, hire charges for instruments, rental fees for the concert venue, promotion of the concerts, and other essential expenses. We will be grateful for any form of support, be it small or large, financial or material!
You can donate either directly to our account 2630162003/5500. Or contact us through emsoc2024@gmail.com. If needed, we are happy to provide you with a formal donation agreement.
We would like to thank you in advance for helping us bring this unique project to life, and we hope to see you at one of our concerts this summer.