Ľubica Čekovská was born in 1975 in Humenne. In 1993-1998 she studied music theory at the Academy of Performing Arts and composition with professor Dušan Martinček. During her postgraduate studies at the Royal Academy of Music in London, she continued her studies in composition with Prof. Paul Patterson and took part in courses with Robert Saxton, Thomas Adès, Arvo Pärt and Harrison Birtwistle. She has been awarded the Cuthbert Nunn Composition Prize of the Royal Academy of Music (1998), the Lewerhulme Award (1999), the Elsie Owen Prize (1999) of the Royal Academy of Music, an ISH Foundation Scholarship from H.R.H. Queen Elizabeth, Queen Mother (1998-2000) and the Jan Levoslav Bella Prize for her composition Piano Concerto (2004, Slovak Music Fund). She received the Tatra banka Foundation Prize for 2013 or on 6 July 2021 she received another award, the Slovak Minister of Culture Prize for 2020. In deciding on this prize, two of her operas, Dorian Gray and Impresario Dotcom, were particularly singled out. In 2023, she won the DOSKY Award in the category of Extraordinary Achievement of the Year for her authorship of the opera Impresario Dotcom. For the year 2023 she was awarded the Prize of the Prešov Self-Governing Region (PSK) for her unique contribution in the field of culture and musical art in Slovakia and for exceptional results with international overlap.
Her works have been performed at major contemporary music festivals. In 2009, her composition “Turbulence” was selected for performance at the ISCM World New Music Days festival in Sweden. In the same year she composed her first full-length opera “Dorian Gray” commissioned by the Slovak National Theatre to a libretto by Kate Pullinger, staged by Nicola Raab, music direction by Christopher Ward, which had a successful premiere in Bratislava in 2013, the world premiere was part of the ISCM World Music Days in Slovakia. In the 2010/2011 season she was composer-in-residence at the Altenburg-Gera Philharmonic.
In 2018 she was commissioned by the Bayerische Rundfunk Choir (BR Chor) to write for them “Three Fragments from Stabat Mater ” which was performed together with Dvořák’s Stabat Mater, at the Prinzregretentheater in Munich under the direction of conductor Howard Arman.
In 2019 she became assistant professor and later associate professor at the Jan Albrecht Academy of Music and Arts in Banská Štiavnica (HUAJA).
In 2020, her second full-length opera, the buffa “Impresario Dotcom” Fassung fur Bregenz, with libretto by Laura Olivi, staged by Elisabeth Stöppler, music by Christopher Ward, had a successful premiere at the Bregenz Festival and was shortened due to Covide’s restrictions from the original 120min to 90min.
Impresario Dotcom was given its Slovak premiere in 2023 on the boards of the Slovak National Theatre in Bratislava.
In 2021 she was commissioned by the Janáček Opera in Brno to write a full-length opera based on Virginia Woolf’s cult novel “Orlando”. The opera “Here I am, Orlando” was based on the English libretto by Viktoria Knotkova, staged by Jiří Heřman, musical staging by Róbert Kružík. The premiere took place on 14 June 2024 at the Janáček Opera, Brno.
He is currently working on several commissions, a newly prepared opera “Judina” for the National Theatre in Košice and a commission for a large symphony orchestra for the 75th anniversary of the Slovak Philharmonic in Bratislava, “Maison de la Musique en sept périodes” planned world premiere on 24 October 2024.
The opera Dorian Gray will be given its German premiere in 2025-26 at the Eduard von Winterstein Theater in Annaberg Buchholz.
The author is represented by the German Baerenreiter Publishing Group
Recently her opera „Here I am Orlando“ has been nominated for this year’s World Premiere Award – International OPERA AWARDS.
She also works on theater and film music, and has dozens of film scores at home and abroad:
- Rukojemník“(dir. J. Nvota),
- „Dubček“(dir. L. Haľama),
- „Kruté radosti“(dir. J. Nvota),
- „Pírko“(dir. L.Klein Svoboda),
- „Tri zlaté Dukáty“(dir. M. Čengel Solčanská),
- „Zakliata Jaskyňa“(dir. M. Čengel Solčanská),
- „Kriminálka Staré Mesto I., II.“(dir. J. Sebechlebský),
- „Kolonáda I., II“ (dir. S. Párnický)
- and many more …
„Čekovská’s painting motif works brilliantly. What starts as a single recorded voice becomes a multi-tracked vocal that degenerates along with Gray’s soul, finally turning into a nails-on-the-blackboard sonic wail. It’s a strikingly effective device, especially used so sparingly.“ „Cekovska’s music shows clear influences of Britten, Shostakovich, Janáček, and Berg, which has been “skillfully homogenized…“ „You can feel purity, austerity and dramatic feeling in herworks….her music radiates with feelings of freshness and the joy of living… beauty and seriousness“ „The new opera “Dorian Gray,” by the young Slovak composer Lubica Cekovska, represents the latter. Ms. Cekovska’s easily grasped, mildly dissonant style, with lyrically oriented vocal lines, underscores, as far as it goes, the unsettling nature of Oscar Wilde’s sinister novel. Tension is created by steady drumbeats, insistent rhythms and swelling chords. Ms. Cekovska interestingly conveys the picture’s disfiguration musically through wordless boy-soprano melodies that recur increasingly distorted.“ „The film’s languorous mood is complemented by a striking score from Ľubica Čekovská“ „Ľubica Čekovská belongs to the one of the most talented composers in her generation“ BREGENZER FESTSPIELE: Endlich eine heitere Corona-OperBACHTRACK, Franck Kuznik, 22nd May 2015, review/ The Pallor of Dorian Gray at Prague spring festival
JUNGHEINRICH, Hans-Klaus: Der unverwüstliche Wüstling. In: Opernwelt 2014/1, s. 35
Arvo Pärt (estonian contemporary composer) – review on her CD „Passing Impressions
Opera review by George Loomis, 13th November 2013
The Times BFI 50th London Film Festival, 2006 CRUAL JOYS, dir.Juraj Nvota
HARMONIE, 9.1.2016, Maxim Belčikov
Frankfurter Allgemeine, 22.08.2020 WERNER M. GRIMMEL
