Markéta Conková

Markéta is a Czech composer, currently based in London. Her endeavour is to combine vivacity with unusual sound worlds, and she often draws inspiration from across music genres, including classical music, jazz, world music, and electronica.

In 2021 she won second prize in the Franz Schubert Conservatory International Composition competition. She is interested in working across different media, and has written film and video game music, as well as participating in an ambient music project for Regent’s Park in London.

Born in Prague, she started her music journey at the age of six, when her parents enrolled her in piano lessons. In her teens she studied composition at the Prague Conservatoire. After graduating from the Conservatoire, she continued for two years at the Academy of Performing Arts in Prague and privately with Jaroslav Krček. She completed both BMus and MMus in Composition at the Royal Academy of Music in London in 2022 and 2024, and is currently pursuing PhD degree in classical composition at the Royal Northern College of Music under the supervision of Prof. Emily Howard, Prof. Nicholas Reyland and Prof. Gary Carpenter.

Markéta is also improving her skills as a sound engineer, and in 2023 she completed a 6 month internship at the Soho Sonic recording studio, where she subsequently joined the team as a junior recording engineer from 2023 - 2025, to ensure she continues to move forward in her career as a versatile musician.

Title: Witold Lutoslawski's and Miloslav Kabeláč's Approach To Form And Repetition

When thinking about the most important elements in music, and what makes a piece of music an ''official'' composition, my very first thoughts lead to form. Regardless of its less in the limelight character, the more nuanced element binds all the ideas together. Until the 20th century, composers built their pieces on the pillars of years-tested canonic structures, with the intention to either adhere to the scheme or disrupt it. A clear universal structure facilitates the compositional process; however, nowadays the form proves less globally definable and more or less depends on one's individual approach.

The motivation for exploring Lutoslawski's and Kabeláč's unique concepts of form and repetition stems from the composers' boldness to imbue the musical structure with new ways of organizing the sonic material, while still preserving certain elements of tradition and finding the right balance. The findings will subsequently be adapted to my own music. I  expect the project to help me improve my grasp of large-scale forms and eventually enable me to form my own understanding of the 'modern' structure. The outcome of my project will be a portfolio of compositions exploring ideas on the two mentioned subjects (form, repetition), and I also endeavour to contribute to the rich classical music heritage.

Currently, through short compositional studies, I am exploring various ideas related to form, repetition, such as Lutoslawski's concept of passive and active perception, as well as Kabeláč's unusual process and distribution of material through time.