Karel Markytán

Karel Markytán about himself: 'I am a Zlín native and I am a singer-songwriter. I was originally a designer of construction site equipment, but then I arranged things differently. Even behind the drawing board, I was thinking about songs more than I thought about construction work and then I went through various jobs while making music. My musical endeavours are linked to the band AG Flek, which I co-founded in 1977.

I started playing in primary school with a friend of mine and the first better-known band I played in was Rosa with Wabi Daněk. We just recorded two songs for the album PÍSNĚ DLOUHEJCH CEST (i.e. Songs of Long Journeys) and I went into the army.

After the military service, AG FLEK began with Ivo Viktorin, Blanka Táborská, Pepa Šobán and later with drummer Zdenek Hromádka. After we got acquainted, we started writing our own songs, and in this line-up we recorded our first album, later called BLÁZNI UMÍRAJÍ NADVAKRÁT (i.e. FOOLS DIE TWICE). At the same time, as a band, we still managed to record with Daněk his most famous album, Rosa na kolejích (i.e. Dew On The Rails).

After several stages and albums DOHRÁLA HUDBA (i.e. The Music's Over) (with Vlasta Redl) and TRAMTÁRIE (i.e. Lalaland) (with Vlasta, Pastrňák, Nytra and Kroczek), in 1992, I left the band, which was increasingly profiled as Vlasta Redl and Co. After a break, we got together in the original trio Viktorin-Táborská-Markytán from 1996 and released a new studio album WALTZ in 2000 and toured for some time.

In 2001, I completed my first solo album, KONEC SLADKOSTÍ (i.e. THE END OF SWEETNESS), with the production help of Klement Jochymek and Petr Vavřík in Studio V in Zlín, CZ, with the participation of several guests, including Blanka and Daňek. Subsequently, I put together ODPOLEDNÍ SMĚNA with the personalities of the Zlín music scene and this period is recorded on the album VEČÍREK (i.e. PARTY).

In 2012 we released a live album with AG FLEK called KONCERT, which are partly audio versions of songs from the previously released eponymous DVD, recorded in 2009, which was not long after the founding trio reunited with Pepa Šobáň and together with Vašíček on guitar and David Velčovský on drums and started playing again as the "original" AG Flek.

In 2018, we recorded and released a new studio album PODNOHAMA ZEM (i.e GROUND UNDER FEET) at Indies. We came up with ten new songs, wrote five each with Ivo, and added a never-recorded collaborative older song, ‘Anonymní přátelé’ (i.e. Anonymous Friends).

Soon Michael Vašíček and David Velčovský left and were replaced by guitarist Petr Hoffmann and drummer Petr Ptáček and we still play in this line-up today. In 2019, thanks to Indies Scope, a re-release of the WALTZ album was released after twenty years.

At the end of October 2023, I finished my new album, called "JE MUZIKA!" , at Ivo Viktorin’s “Studio V” in Zlín, CR. It is, with a few exceptions, my original work, with which I was helped by Petr Vavřík on bass and Marcel Gabriel on drums. Petr also supervised it as a producer, and he and Marcel also did the studio work and mixed it all. Guitars were recorded by Petr Hoffmann, keyboards by Milan Nytra. Singer-songwriter and actor Martin Kyšperský from the band Květy and singer-songwriter Eliška Lajdová from Zlín sang with me in duets. ALuboš Novotný on lap steel guitar, Pavel Skopal on trumpet, backing vocals sung by Markéta Vodičková and the male choir Mužáky from Zlín are the album guests. The backing vocals were sung by Markéta Vodičková and MIchael Markytán. I was lucky to have excellent creative musicians and I thank them in this way as well. Damir Grbič took care of the cover design and the album was released on 26.4. 2024 at Indies Scope in Brno, CR.