The July issue of the Slovak popular women’s magazine Madam Eva brought an extensive interview with Karel Gott entitled I Didn’t Believe in Marriage. If you are interested in the Madam Eva magazine, send your request to this address: MADAM EVA, Lenka Opaterová, Prievozská 14, Bratislava, Slovakia or to this e-mail: madameva@ringier.sk Or you can read the interview here:

Madam Eva exclusive interview

I Didn’t Believe in Marriage
Text: Timea Keresztényiová
Photo: Petr Adámek and Dušan Křístek



I thought that all those years in journalism have made me a seasoned professional; that my tongue would never be tied with stage fright and that I would not lean my elbow against a firm surface to mask a shaking tape machine in my hand. During my interview with the most gold of all Golden Nightingales I kept my whole arm in check and I almost didn’t say a word but my behavior was excused with so many mitigating circumstances! Those blue eyes. THAT VOICE! That respect.
Karel Gott gave us an interview that you cannot read anywhere else

Everybody tells to himself: ‘When I have a child I won’t repeat my parents’ mistakes.’ Were you aware of any such mistakes?
Being a parent is about keeping balance. Both parents have their roles. One must be the tough guy. My father wanted me to get a good job, to be a craftsman or electric equipment designer. And my mom quietly supported my artistic tendencies. Be it painting or singing... My father used to tell me: “You can sing at a campsite at weekend, but stick to a proper job during workdays. That’ll do until your retirement. Yet it was he that I inherited strong self-discipline from, which, I think, an artist should have. If an artist is an unreliable mess, or hits the bottle and takes his fan club’s support for granted, he does not get too far.
When your mom died you were expected to sing in front of full Lucerna that same night. And you went on stage and sang. Where did you get the strength to do it?
That’s not about strength. The point is not to keep sitting and ruminating. It’s all about concentration. I chose my way. Just like the lyrics of one famous opera says: ”...Smile, comedian, no matter how you feel. You have to.” By coincidence, when my mom died I had a concert in Germany. But there were many moments in my career when I could hardly make a sound during an afternoon rehearsal but I went on stage at night no matter how awful I felt. People must not notice that you are sick or sad. They are not interested in it. Sometimes I wondered whether I should tell them about it. But I never did. They did not pay for moaning and whining, but for a performance they know from my albums or CD’s. By analogy, this lack of professionalism is inexcusable with athletes. Nobody is interested in hearing that they had a toothache on a contest day. One day the fans love them, the other they reject them if their performance is not good enough.
What are the feelings of an artist who is coerced study to become an electro mechanic?
The factory where I worked back then was pulled down a long time ago. But I had perhaps ten concerts in the O2 Hall that was built on the same lot. I believe in the power of thoughts. Even back then when I worked there I claimed: “I will sing in Las Vegas!” And everybody laughed. Everybody. Karel is a moron, they whispered! Imagine him singing in Vegas??!!! Eight years passed and I sent the factory guys a postcard from Las Vegas. Or when I saw Elvis’s vocal choir the Jordanaires at his last concert in 1977, I told to myself that I’d sing with them one day too. In two years I was back in Nashville and performed together with the Jordanaires. I am convinced that if you set your mind on something you will achieve it. When I started my career everybody told me it was not likely to last beyond my thirtieth birthday; that new young guys would come and push me aside with a new hit. And here I am... (smiling)
Yes, you are. Even though our countries, the Czech Republic and Slovakia, went their separate ways you have remained their national treasure. Did you always manage to rise above opposite voices and let it go in the spirit of C´est la vie?
I kept on believing in my style, I believed it was an avant-garde that had a chance to make it. Then I gave one performance at the Lyra contest in Bratislava, which opened a door to Polydor for me. I signed my first contract with it and our cooperation has lasted to this date! 44 years! All these were accidents and confidences. They take just one second and push your life in a direction you never thought about.
So, you don’t believe in fate.
No, I believe in accidents and coincidences. By accident my parents met, fell in love, got married and decided to have a baby. Of millions of sperms only one made its way to the right egg cell and by coincidence it was me. Should I believe that this scenario can be preplanned?!
Today show business is more about business rather than show. Did it use to be different?
We could produce one album in 14 days! Just like buns in a bakery. And a single record? When a song grabbed my attention, I called the conductor of the Czechoslovak Radio Dancing Orchestra, Jiří Štaidl wrote lyrics overnight, arrangement was secured, the orchestra had it recorded it by noon, and I did my part after lunch. Quite often I was already in a studio and Štaidl was finishing the last verse in another room!!! That is to say that I started recording a new song not knowing how the lyrics was going to end... Then the mixing was done and the ready single could be aired in the evening. We did not make much money, but we had so much fun and joy! We were captured in the endless whirl of music.
Would you say your life has been a journey through paradise?
No, but it has to appear like that. Otherwise, my listeners could be disappointed... (smiling) If I told you how thorny and bumpy my way through life has been, your readers would probably not be pleased.
But they would. After all we walk the same ways.
My impression is that women long for romance and that is the bottom line of success. You want to spend your life with a partner with whom you will experience something wonderful. You do not want to simply get married, have kids and then when they go to sleep to fall asleep, together with your husband, in front of TV... Women desire to believe that their life is a journey through paradise. And with me? (smiling) I can see it in the faces of girls, women and sometimes even mothers... They whisper to each other saying: “He would be Mr. Right for my daughter! She would travel the world on his side, she’d enjoy life...”
Is it difficult to put up with you?
I don’t think so. I always tried to leave a good impression, even after a break up. And I believe that none of my girlfriends upbraids me with anything and none of them can say I behaved like a "bastard".
That’s true. The legends about you are always positives.
Are they?
I swear.
You see, many people asked whether I have lost my female fans since I got married. Just the opposite! Years ago it might have been different but today I even get letters in which women write to me "about time", "good for you", "you both deserve it," etc.
Yet it was not too long ago that you were considered the most wanted but hard-to-get bachelor. What mistakes did your other girlfriends do that Ivanka didn’t?
It was not about any mistake. Ivanka did similar things. All of a sudden started rearranging things in my house ... (laughing)... Just like her predecessors. Simply, I was not mature enough to tie the knot. And I was convinced that marriage would put my career to an end.
Why?
They don’t go together. But I matured with Ivanka by my side, we were expecting our second baby, my two daughters from previous relationships were already adult, so what would my life look like?! Moreover, I do enjoy my life now. I’ve done so much singing that if I had cut down on my showbiz activities, which is not the case, I could say I have had my share of work and now can enjoy being with my family, going on trips and all “ordinary” things. To mature also means to come to believe that things will work just fine. Ivanka and I spent 8 years together and we told each other: ”Alright, I want you with all your faults, and travelling life.”
And all your past and the alleged 462 lovers...?
I would never pronounce any number of this sort! Not even if it was true. That’s ranting, nothing else? Boasting is not my style.
I found it hard to believe myself. After all, beyond, let’s say, a thirty-fifth romance the rest must seem pretty much indiscernible?!
... (laughing) I must be in love. That’s the way I am. Otherwise, it would not work!
"It"?
Yes, it. By the way, this was why I didn’t get married: I didn’t want the fire go out. That was the other reason why I didn’t believe in marriage. Suddenly, you face ordinary days, everyday problems... “Have you been there? Did you mail it? Will you go and see to that paperwork? When are we going shopping? Where do you think you are going again? THE END! The end of romanticism, moonlit arias...
In 2003, when you suffered a stroke, Ivanka de facto saved your life. Did it make you two even closer?
I wish you saw the letters she received... Do you think anyone appreciated what she’d done? Friends or relatives... But women wrote: "So what, I could do that too", "That’s a peace of cake, a commonplace."
You wife is 36 your junior. Have you discussed your future? Doesn’t she worry too much about you?
She does. Before, she worried normally. But ever since we had the kids, we have often been thinking of what their lives will be like before they find their niche in life. That’s why I keep on telling them to marry an ice hockey player or a footballer! (laughing) Just kidding. We talk about things that need to be done to get all our expenses covered... I’m not sure whether my wife could handle it all if something happened to me.
And do you consider what would follow if something happened to you?
Above all I think about what’s going to happen in general. With the world, not only with me. The future looks quite gruesome in many ways. When I open a serious newspaper these days, I skip the reports about politics’ bickering and got right to economics and business where I find all answers. I read there, and quire precisely, or between lines, how the world’s bearing up, who profited from the crisis...
Still, I don’t find your daughters’ future so bleak. Once our moms were your fans, today twenty-year-olds listen to your songs. Your songs represent the most successful phenomenon in the history of Czech pop music.
Fortunately, it turned out that this music lives on its own sort of planet where it survives against all odds.
Besides singing you also paint beautiful pictures. That must be perfect mental hygiene to share your thought through a song or on canvas.
To me painting is a need to balance one type of artistic expression with another. Painting is an absolute opposite to singing. As I said above, showbiz tells a comedian to laugh at all cost, but painting is about an idea I get today and about the urge to paint it right now. And if it does not work out, it doesn’t matter. I throw that canvas away. As I am not a professional artist, I have no deadlines or job orders to meet. Unlike regular artists I do not work with anyone who’d finish details of my paintings. Art is the idea itself, not its perfection. Even the greatest of all masters worked with apprentices. I pride on the fact that I paint everything, even the last tiniest detail myself. That’s why I always paint at night and some pictures take me even one or two years.
What is it that brings you to the studio to record a new album today?
The pure joy of music. It was exactly the case with my recent album Lidovky mého srdce (Folk Songs in My Heart). No calculations, market estimates, marketing strategies! I had this idea to return to the essence of music. These days it takes even two years to cut an album and every project involves so much planning and calculating. It takes forever to find songs I like and am happy about...! But above all I reject lyrics. They are about nothing and I need something meaningful. I cannot sing songs just about anything. Can you imagine me singing, for instance, about hot chicks on the beach? I’d look perverse.
You worked with the greatest music names. How do you perceive the fact that many of them died before their time? For instance, Petr Muk...
You see, everybody had a different reason. We all knew about Petr’s problems. I know people with the same diagnosis as him and I am sure of one thing: these people must quit drinking. I never saw Petr stagger or anything like that. He was a bon vivant. There was always something we could talk about. He was interested in similar things like me. But what’s the reason, what’s the underlying cause?
Do you try to lead a healthy lifestyle?
I swear by the theory that the body tells us what it needs. It lets me know I need sugar. Then I do not consider whether it makes me gain weight or not. When my body orders me to have some coffee I get myself a cup. And then my body warns what not to eat. When I enter a restaurant and smell burnt oil, for instance from making French fries, it literally make me sick from my stomach. Yet kids love it most! But when I fry a tasty Wiener schnitzel in my kitchen, I don’t mind a bit of fat.
Can you really make a schnitzel!?
I guess everybody can do that. I tenderize the meat, coat in eggs, flour and breadcrumbs and fry it in a pan?
You know enough to get married.
Who know? Perhaps that’s why Ivanka married me.
Did you always know who was interested in you because of your fame, your money or yourself?
That’s something you can’t tell. However, I knew that Ivana was not really crazy about my songs or my voice. When driving she’d listen to Petr Muk! That told me that she probably liked me as a man. She was not one of my fanatic admirers. And since I have debts she can’t have liked me for money –...
... Debts? You? I don’t believe that.
... (laughing) My property is encumbered with all kinds of burdens. Just like everybody else’s...
Can’t you afford to do only what you want?
No, life is full of compromises…
How did you manage to remain the same after so many years of perpetual fame? That is to say courteous, charming and down to earth?
That’s only discipline that springs from my disbelief in any certainties. I stick to my way and think not only of tomorrow but of the time six months ahead. I have already planned my autumn tour. The repertoire I will present. I believe I’m going to be healthy and this belief convinces me it’s going to be that way.

Karel Gott is a living legend and the most popular singer of all times in the Czech Republic and Slovakia. He studied a vocational school for electrical mechanics. At the beginning of his music career his pioneering expression was not really appreciated by critics. However, in the 1660’s his popularity started to grow and after his engagement in Las Vegas he returned home to conquer the music scene, which he did in a record short time. The winner of 35 Golden Nightingales has sold over 50 million albums and has recorded about 1800 songs. He has daughters Dominika, Lucie, Charlotte Ella and Nelly Sofia; in 2008 he married his partner of many years, Ivana Macháčková. Karel Gott continues to give concerts. His next tour will be produced this upcoming autumn when he will be joined by world-famous soprano diva Eva Urbanová. They will have concerts in Bratislava, Žilina and Košice.