Nicolas Party, Face to Face, 2018, Courtesy the artist and Hauser & Wirth; Foto: Isabelle Arthuis
The Excursions of Mr. Brouček
Leoš Janáček
About
Matěj Brouček really wants just one thing: to be left in peace. The world outside is too loud, too complicated, too exhausting. But life has other plans: Brouček is torn from his comfort zone—first catapulted to the moon, then into 15th-century Prague: An odyssey with grotesque societies, bizarre trials, and a past that feels strangely unfamiliar.
With The Excursions of Mr. Brouček, Leoš Janáček created an opera of biting wit and profound comedy—a satire on bourgeois complacency, moral laziness, and humanity’s eternal inability to learn from history. Yet Janáček’s critique is never cynical. Like Mozart, he approaches humanity with subtle irony and profound empathy. With virtuosic ease and a richly nuanced musical language, he moves effortlessly between irony and earnestness, waltzing bliss and pathos—imbuing his music with a deeply human dimension.
Opera in two acts (1920, rev. 1926)
Act I: Mr. Brouček’s journey to the moon Libretto by Leoš Janáček based on the novel Pravý výlet pana Broučka do Měsíce by Svatopluk Čech in collaboration with Karel Mašek, Zykmund Janke, František Gellner, Viktor Dyk und František Serafínský Procházka
Act II: Mr. Brouček’s journey into the 15th century Libretto by Leoš Janáček based on the novel Nový epochální výlet pana Broučka, tentokráte do XV. století by Svatopluk Čech in collaboration with František Serafínský Procházka
