At Music Concerts, The Man Behind the Scene

By Tomáš Kaplan

I always want to know what it was like to own a bar or music club. I chose the Alterna Music Club because it´s my favorite in Brno. And I was really surprised how easy it was negotiate a meeting with the club manager.
People slowly go inside the hall, one by one. They order some drinks, pay and leave to take best seats near the small stage where instruments silently wait for their masters – musicians.
Rush of voices is mixing with quick steps of barmans and jangling of glass. After a few minutes lazy evening is changing to busy night and club is full of people. It is almost 8 p.m. and space is going dark, audience stops talking. On the bar desk one barman lights on the candles and on the stage come the members of the band.
At the end of bar sits a guy who observes everything carefully. First tones of music fill the place, and he tunes in and out. His name is Libor Dostál, who has now managed his Alterna Music Club through 13 years of concerts.
Dostál is himself a producer and big fan of music. For almost 15 years he’s worked in the music industry, developing his music club into one with a respected name among both musicians and costumers.
“Everytime I return to the Czech Republic, to Brno, I played here,” says one of the most famous Czech jazz guitar players, Rudy Linka, after his concert in Alterna on Nov. 16. “Everything is perfect: the audience, service, sound etc. And I don´t want to change it.”
Alterna is big open space, red carpet, colorful wallpapers with mystic symbols on the walls, long bar, many tables, non-smoking hall and much light.
“At big concerts we can let go inside almost 300 people,” said Antonín Adam, one of the employees of the club. “But it is a new age. We had reconstruction this summer, before that it was little bit darker and smaller too.”
This year Alterna has unofficial 18^th birthday. Everything started in 1989. At the time of the Velvet Revolution, changes started everywhere. Dostál was a student. He lived in the student dormitories, where there were, and still are, large rooms on ground floor. In those times, the rooms were specified for meetings of SSM [Socialist Union of Youth].
Then only 21, he turned them into the Alterna Music Club.
“After revolution rooms stayed empty. Sometimes there were students meetings, some parties, but nothing organized,” said Dostál. SSM felt down, everywhere was a chaos.
He studied at Faculty of Engineering and fearless idea grew up in his mind. In dormitories lived almost thousand students, but no pub was around. He saw the opportunity.
“I don`t know how, but once I stayed face to face with the director of the dormitories and I asked him to let for rent this place like a student club and he agreed.” Dostál was young, didn’t have management experience, just some experiences like a barman in some part-time jobs and business brain. It was a first step for Alterna Music Club, opportunity was taken.
The beginning was slow, step by steps, beer just in bottles, a few kinds of alcoholic drinks, then came the first contract with a brewery.
“After this contract everything moved quickly,” he says. “Brewery saw the same thing like me. Many people live in one place.”
From this time he knew that owning the pub needn´t be only fun, but also really good way to earn money. From a young student of Socialist university, he transformed into a capitalist businessman: “I know that’s a paradox, but I did a job that entertained me and earned some money for me, too.”
At the pub everything was going fine, but after a few years, for Dostál it became a bit boring to own some place where people drink beers and shots. After he graduated from university, he knew one thing. He didn’t want to do what he studied for, he wanted to stay in his pub. But something had to change: “I was still young. A 25-year-old. I want more, some movement.”
Dostál has one love his entire life – music. In 1995 he established Fantom Promotion and tried another business, production of music concerts.
“I was the first in Brno. In Prague there was a big company like Ticket Stream. But here was nobody. Of course people wanted to go to concerts in Brno same as in Prague.” It was almost the same history as with his pub. Many people, but a few of music concerts.
“I like music, like to listen to music, but here I need to confess. I saw primarily economic aspects. Profit for me.” He started in Alterna, from this time renaming it to Alterna Music Club. Perfect space for small concerts. But after his first successes, he started to organize bigger projects like Chumbawamba tour around the Czech Republic.
“That was too much. Always on the phone, always stress, will the weather be OK, will there be enough of people, etcetera. After this in 2001 I finished with organizing of big concerts and tours and just prepared concerts for Alterna.”
But Dostál still wants more, some progress. Five years ago he opened a second club and last summer he shared his experiences and helped grew another student club in Brno, called Stará Pekárna. He gave his advice. His second club was situated under Alterna Music Club and called A2. Before that it was disco club Spider, but it went bankrupt.
“It’s perfect space, in the basement, no noise going on the street. Good for a party,” says Aleš Měřínský, one of the ex-employees of A2 club.
Adds Dostál: “I want separate groups of students. At Alterna I want more alternative music, jazz, rock, world music, and in A2 funky, pop and electro.” And in A2 he sometimes arranges exhibitions of photos and pictures, too.

“Libor is really good at organizing many things. It’s a good experience working with him,” said Adam Bernard, nicknamed Bernie, a photographer who works for many clubs in Brno like music photographer of concerts.
But Dostál grows older. He will soon be 40, with a wife and two young daughters.
“Now I want to rest more,” he says. “The clubs are going fine. I’m really satisfied in this situation.”
He has the clubs, where he can still drink at the bar with friends, and listen to music he wants to listen to. And if he can stay on his feet, he will work in music and keep his clubs alive for many years into the future: “Now it’s my big dream. Grow older with my clubs together and my family, too. Of course!”