Cobbler, stick to your last!
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Jaromír Konrády comes from a famous piper family from Chod, and the family craft and music is what has accompanied him throughout his life. He was born on August 21, 1944 in Domažlice. He grew up in the workshop of his father Jakub, who was a repairman and maker of musical instruments. However, the regime did not allow him to continue in the footsteps of his ancestors – when he applied for an apprenticeship to repair pianos at the Petrof company in the late 1950s, he received an invitation to the entrance exams only after their deadline. The reason – the father successfully resisted the nationalisation of his music business back in 1958, the continuation of his son Jaromír in the same trade was no longer desirable in the political situation at the time. Jaromír Konrády started learning to be a carpenter. He did not stop making music even during his studies at the Secondary School of Arts and Crafts in Prague that he started in 1962 and he became a member of the Prague folklore ensemble Psohlavci. In 1975, he moved to Pilsen to join his family and continued to play the bagpipes in the Folk Ensemble of Songs and Dances JISKRA, toured Europe with the ensemble and later led it himself. After 1989, the musical instrument repair workshop was returned to the family, and Jaromír Konrády and his brother returned to the family trade. He has been awarded several times for his work – in December 2018 he received the title of Master of Traditional Handicrafts of the Pilsen Region, in 2019 the Minister of Industry awarded the Konrády brothers an award for the extraordinary contribution of the family business to the Pilsen region. In 1996, Jaromír Konrády was at the birth of the International Folklore Festival CIOFF Pilsen.
