Jan Čižmář

After completing his guitar and musicology studies in his native Brno, Czech Republic, Jan Cizmar was at the Royal College of Music in London studying classical guitar and later lute with Jakob Lindberg. Following were his studies with Nigel North, Joachim Held, Mike Fentross and Christina Pluhar at the Royal Conservatory in Den Haag, The Netherlands. As well he has taken masterclasses with Hopkinson Smith, Evangelina Mascardi and Yasonuri Immamura.

Jan Cizmar is versatile performer on plucked instruments, in last years focusing on historical lutes and early guitars. He has performed with groups such as Royal Concertgebouw Orchestra, Orkest van de 18de Euuw (Frans Brüggen), Orchestra of the Age of Enlightenment (OAE), Collegium 1704 (Václav Luks), Ensemble baroque de Limoges (Christophe Coin), Ensemble Elyma (Gabriel Garrido), European Baroque Orchestra (EUBO), Britten Pears Baroque Orchestra (BPBO) or Vox Luminis at festivals across Europe, in Asia and in USA.

In his non-early music past he was busy as a rock, jazz and later as a classical guitarist. He toured Europe with New York production of Jesus Christ Superstar as a rock guitarist and has appeared on stage a.o. with the Lindsay Kemp Company - Spanish tour of Elisabeth I: El ultimo baile, Leine & Roebana Dance company, a.o.

Jan plays various instruments - different types of mostly historical lutes and guitars:

Since few years Jan Cizmar is occupied with exploring a musical history of one particular castle. Although the very rich collection of music and musical instruments itself is housed today in the Brno Museum Music Archive, its exact history is rather obscure. Except of the surviving materials of mostly unknown composers there is no direct evidence of the musical life at the castle. However it is clear that there must have been a rich musical life. The italian family Magni have brought with them many people from Italy, with this group had to come the instruments, some already written music and the musicians, who produced the rest.