Iva Bittová | Biography

The Czech violinist and singer Iva Bittová describes her work as “my own personal folk music.”  In her singularly original and powerful performances, Bittova sings, plays, and acts simultaneously to create pieces that have been described as “… so intimate and personal you can almost feel her breath on your ears.” (CMJ).  Her compositions and improvisations are highly abstract yet deeply rooted in the classical and gypsy music of the tiny Moravian villages where she spent her formative years.  Uninhibited and unaffected, Bittová sings about issues that affect women in poetry that is sensual, fervent and evocative.

A charismatic performer with an established reputation both in Europe and Japan, Bittová toured the US as a solo performer in 1990 and again in 1998, selling out shows in Boston, New York, and Berkeley. The New York Times said, “Ms. Bittová is a true cosmopolitan, but she remains grounded in local expressions, and her own physicality. She takes on the role of the singer as town crier whose voice animates old myths and current news. Ms. Bittová’s town is her self, ruled by the rhythms of sexuality, the flights of her imagination and the realities of modern social life.”

As much at home in classical music as in avant-garde and folk, she has sung the role of Donna Elvira in the Mozart opera “Don Juan in Prague” as well as performed and recorded songs by Janácek. In 2005, she began collaborating with the Bang On A Can All-Stars, recording the CD “Elida” (Cantaloupe Music), and performing together in concerts in New York at Carnegie’s Zankel Hall, in Philadelphia, Los Angeles as well as in London and Prague, among others.

Iva Bittová was born in Bruntal, in northern Moravia. Her father, a classical double bass player, relocated the family often. Bittová attended violin and ballet classes as a child and also appeared in the Silesian Theatre of Zdenek Nejedly. As a teenager she attended a local conservatory and studied music and drama. Upon completion of school in Brno, she won a contract at the avant-garde Theatre On A String. She has since appeared in multiple television and film roles, including the documentary film about Fred Frith, “Step Across The Border.”

Reflecting on her life-long work as a performer, Bittová has said, “I have found the way to myself and thus also to others. I understand there are many hearts in the world, and each beats differently.”