THE FIRST CD PRESENTATION OF KAREL GOTT AND HIS ROMANTIC FEELING
In May 2005, on the occasion of the month of love, Supraphon is going to issue the very first CD album Romantika, originally recorded by Karel Gott in 1978. This is one of the singer’s dramatically purest albums, which – like the Vánoce ve zlaté Praze album from 1969 - resisted the ravages of time, an implacable enemy. The renewed release of remastered Romantika has been clamored for not only by Gott’s fans for years. The singer himself looks forward to Romantika with an unprecedented pleasure. No surprise we started our interview by asking him the following question:

What do you recall when you hear Romantika?

Definitely an album, that was – and not only in my opinion – a great success. The sound of this LP album shows that the Supraphon recording studio ’Mozarteum’ was filled with a beautiful and inspiring atmosphere. Put simply, even today, twenty-seven years from its production I am still proud of Romantika. Believe me, I could not claim the same about all of the albums I have done during my forty-years’ career as a singer. I am convinced that to this date Romantika has not lost anything from its charm and I would be pleased if it continued to bring unique moments of love and contentment to its listeners’ even in the 21st century.

Who came with the idea to record this particular album?

Everything started at the Yamaha International Popular Music Festival, Tokyo, in 1974 where I received a Cherry Flower Award for the rendering of the song ‘Ať láska má kde kvést’ composed by Karel Svoboda and Zdeněk Borovec. It was on the occasion of my then stay in Japan that the leading local music publisher Nippon Columbia – that both included in its catalog Supraphon’s classical music records and initiated certain recording projects – released my album ‘Poklady minulosti’ that I had recorded in 1972 for Polydor of Germany. The latter album presented the German versions of classical melodies that had been known to that time only in their orchestral renditions. The melodies were composed by Verdi, Tchaikovsky, Bach, Albinoni, Rimski– Korsakoff, Mozart, Schumann and Vivaldi. Three years later, in 1977, Karel Svoboda and Zdeněk Borovec’s song ‘Jdi za štěstím’ was among the best songs selected from 1 500 music pieces from 45 countries worldwide to compete at another year of the Yamaha Festival; I made another trip to Tokyo to receive a prize for an outstanding artistic performance. However, the Nippon Columbia representatives conditioned my participation in the festival on making an English-sung album of mine available on the Japanese market at the time of my stay so that I could personally present it to Japanese TV viewers and radio listeners. In this same context, the English version of ‘Romantika’ started to come into existence in Supraphon recording studio ‘Mozarteum’ in the fall of 1977. The record was sold in Japan under the name ‘Go In Search Of Happiness’ (which was the name of the English version of the song Jdi za štěstím). Later, in 1979, the English version was adopted by Artia, a Czechoslovak foreign trade organization, that exported the album under the name ‘My Romantic Feeling’. Amiga, the then music record publisher from Eastern Germany, released the album under the name ‘Amore Mio’.

Is it true that Romantika was the first album whose preparation meant your first professional meeting with dr. František Janeček?

Yes, it is. However, František’s title shown on the album was ‘Artistic Cooperation’, which was due to the fact that the title ‘producer’ was not really welcome here at that time and Supraphon was even made to cancel it.

What was the main idea behind the production of Romantika?

We tried to select melodies that could communicate the romantic feelings of the second half of the 1970’s. We were not concerned with nostalgia. On the contrary, our main effort was to maintain the sound of the romantic atmosphere that was part of our life. We wanted to make an album with a homogenous romantic mood. This is why we chose songs that conveyed a kind, pleasant atmosphere and that had been composed for me or that had been successful abroad. Songs that could bring the right contentment for the moments filled with love or deep thoughts. All of the songs were arranged in a modern way by the pianist Rudolf Rokl, whose ability to translate my romantic ideas into music did not have a match. I recorded the album with the accompaniment of the Grand Orchestra conducted by Ladislav Štaidl and Milivoj Uzelac. Štaidl’s band provided a basis that was added with the strings, winds and a chorus.

What songs did you choose for the album?

The album is opened by the balladic hit ‘Your Song’ by Elton John from 1969 whose Czech lyrics called ‘Deštivý den’ were written by Pavel Kopta as one of his best pieces. The Czech lyrics of the song ‘Kdo z nás smí se vrátit’ were created by Zdeněk Borovec. This song, originally called ‘Could It Be Magic’, caught my attention when sung by Barry Manilow who composed it in 1975 based on Frederyk Chopin’s Prelude c moll. The lyricist Zdeněk Rytíř wrote the Czech version of ‘Teď už víš, že jsem to já’ that was originally performed by Wilfred “Blue“ Lovett under the name ‘Kiss And Say Goodbye’, a song that I found for myself in the repertoire of a black soul band called Manhattans. We were lucky to work on the song’s recitative with the actor Jiří Němeček; he and a mixed vocal chorus comprising Jitka Zelenková, Jarmila Gerlová, Vlasta Kahovcová, Slávek Talián, Bohuslav Myslík and Josef “Bažík“ Pavelka enriched this song with an unrepeatable atmosphere.

I am still waiting for your mentioning the song Kam tenkrát šel můj bratr that caused one of your best, if not the very best album to receive practically no promotion. The LP album Romantika was nearly withdrawn from the market for gramophone records.

Before going into the details of the case you have just mentioned, I’d like to say that I found the song ‘All By Myself’ in the repertoire of the American singer, composer and pianist Eric Carmen who composed it based on Sergey Rachmaninoff’s piano concert No. 2. But let’s go back to your question. At the time when we recorded Romantika it was absolutely unthinkable to sing at our concerts the great song ‘Hej, páni konšelé’ composed by Jaromír Klempíř and Jiří Štaidl for which I won a Bronze Bratislava Lyre Award in 1969. I simply knew that I was not supposed to sing the song.

Why? Was it prohibited by anyone?

There was no specific ban. But the ideologists after the year 1969 had their little clever concepts. Nothing was prohibited in writing - songs or singers. Nobody saw a document reading: “Prohibited“, or “Not to be shown on TV“. However, organizers knew with whom they could make contracts and we learned to understand the situation. The song I’ve spoken about had to be withdrawn and even destroyed by Supraphon. So, I got that I could not provoke with it.

When the album Romantika was released in 1978, introducing, amongst others, the song Kam tenkrát šel můj bratr Jan, there were rumors among people that you had devoted the song to the memory of Jan Palach.

And it was so, indeed. It was the idea of the lyricist Zdeňek Borovec. Yet, I could not say this out loud then. Naturally, there were people who informed the authorities. But the situation in general was much worse. The song ‘Hej, páni konšelé’ was a single, whereas Romantika was a complete album. Moreover, it was truly a wonderful album, one of the most beautiful albums of mine. And its production cost a lot of money. The first edition released 150,000 records and all of them were supposed to be withdrawn. Fortunately, there were some people at important posts who prevented the withdrawal. Romantika sold nearly 250,000 records.

Still, I know a few people who have never believed that you were singing about Jan Palach in 1978.

The only thing I knew at that time was that I was not allowed to irritate the system with the song on the stage. This was why I sang it only once, during Karel Gott TV show from the Lucerna music hall. I chose not to publicly present the other songs from the Romantika album wither. The only exception was the song ‘Do re mi la’ by Ladislav Štaidl and Michael Prostějovský or the traditional song ‘Na rozloučenou’. The making of the Czech version of this world evergreen was inspired by one of my German singles from 1977 that presented this song – which is sung by the people in Anglo-American countries on New Year’s Eve – as performed by a large chorus, orchestra and me. Also, we should not forget the song ‘Pár havraních copánků’. I recorded this song as early as 1964 and later in 1974. But Elvis Presley’s sudden death in 1977 swept me off my feet and I decided to brush up my version of his hit ‘Love Me Tender’ from 1956 to pay tribute to this great persona and one of my favorite singers.

This year radio listeners have had the first opportunity to hear the special radio version of your song Kam tenkrát šel můj bratr Jan. Who came with the idea to transform just this song into a special radio format?

It was the music journalist Josef Vlček who has an incredibly vast knowledge of world and Czech popular music and who knows pretty well which songs have the potential to succeed on the radio. He considers the song ‘Kam tenkrát šel můj bratr Jan’ to be one of the most romantic melodies in my repertoire and he has always regretted that its more than seven minutes long track is not practicable for radio broadcasting. He persuaded me that there is sense in cutting the song short into a format that could be played on the radio. Our hearts were bleeding when we were cutting out a wondrous piano solo by Rudolf Rokl. The special radio version of ‘Kam tenkrát šel můj bratr Jan’ was the responsibility of Oldřich Slezák who is in charge of the remastering of the most of my Supraphon tracks. And I should say that he is really excellent at what he does.

What other songs from the Romantika album would you like to mention?

The last song on the first album side is ‘Aria’ which was originally performed by the Italian composer, singer and pianist Dario Baldan Bembo. I also took a great pleasure including in Romantika the Czech version by Jaroslav Machek of ‘Amore mio’ that had been composed especially for me by my Italian friend, composer Joe Sentieri. I scored success with this song not only in a German hit parade but also among the listeners in the countries of the former Soviet Union.

Finally, some songs from your original repertoire.

Romantika also introduces two beautiful melodies by Petr Hapka with lyrics by Zdeněk Borovec – ‘Lorelay’ and ‘Vším byl bych rád’. A few people know that I was the first singer to render Hapka’s song as early as 1964. Its name was ‘Malá píseň’. When I listened to Romantika after so many years I felt a great desire to sing Hapka’s song live at my concerts. And I felt the same way about the song ‘Až jednou’ by the composer Karel Svoboda and the lyricist Zdeněk Borovec; their song is about a singer who has enjoyed decades of success and now is contemplating what’s going to happen when people – and even himself - lose interest in his songs.

Are the music collectors going to find interesting bonuses on the CD Romantika?

Yes and no. We carefully considered what kind of bonuses should be included in Romantika because we did not want to disturb the atmosphere the album radiates when listened to. We also did not want to interfere with its dramaturgic purity. This is why the CD Romantika offers music collectors English versions of some songs from the LP album My Romantic Feeling released by Artia (The album did not contain the English version of the Czech song Lorelay that was created by the lyricist Felice Gordon under the name ‘So In Love’), from my Japanese album Go In Search Of Happiness, and from the album Amore mio published by Amiga of East Germany.

Did you record another similarly outlined album after Romantika?

Yes. It was in 1984 and the LP album released by Supraphon was named ‘Hrátky s láskou’. I assume that Supraphon will publish its CD version in the foreseeable future. This album has also been successful, which is evidenced by the fact that that its songs such as ‘Lásko má’, ‘Hrátky s láskou’, ‘To musím zvládnout sám’,’ Z dávných dnů’ or ‘Jak ten proud’ can sometimes be heard at my concerts where the audiences’ response and applause tell me that they appreciate these musical comebacks. But as you know – you cannot step in the same river twice. Therefore, there is only one Romantika in my life and I’d be happy if it found its way to new listeners.

Thank you for the interview.

Jan Adam
(The author is the editor of the Karel Gott Komplet CD series and of Karel Gott’s official web pages at www.karelgott.com)