Iveta Kováčová graduated from a secondary teacher-training school in Litoměřice, specializing in preschool education and speech therapy. She taught in kindergartens for six years and devoted herself to singing. Today, she takes care of preschool children in an informal children's group.
In 1986, she won a national competition for beginning singers in Jihlava, where Václav Neckář noticed her and offered her a guest appearance in the band Bacily. She graduated from the conservatory in Prague, sang in jazz bands (5P, Naima), performed in the musicals Hair and Krysař (The Pied Piper), and in 1999 founded the female vocal group Triny (together with Jana Procházková and Dagmar Podkonická), which draws on Roma folk songs and has released three CDs to date: Gipsy streams (2001), Aven (2005), and most recently Néve (2010). Triny also forms the vocal section of the ensemble Camael, which draws inspiration mainly from Moravian folklore.
From 1998 to 2005, she worked for Czech Television as a presenter, then for two years as an editor for the ČT24 programme Před půlnocí (Before Midnight), taught at the conservatory, worked as an editor for several magazines (ČT+), and hosted the radio programme Ethnoland on Ethno Radio. Iveta Kováčová considers Romani her mother tongue, but writes in Czech. She has published in Literární noviny and Bulletin Slovo. Her short story “Cesta domů” (The Way Home, 2014) was published on the Romea.cz website and in the e-book Moji milí (My Dear Ones, Kher), and subsequently also in the anthology Všude samá krása (Nothing but Beauty Everywhere, Kher, 2021).
Photo: Lukáš Houdek
