Hlinka was born in Prague, Protectorate of Bohemia and Moravia, and was a student of František Rauch and Josef Páleníček at the Prague Academy of Music. He started giving concerts in 1966 and reached the finals of the International Tchaikovsky Competition in Moscow the same year.Reference to Tchaikovsky competition He recorded Sergei Prokofiev's piano sonatas 2 and 6 for Supraphon in 1967. The album was released in Norway in 1998.
