Antonín Dvořák
Every month, Composer of the Month takes you on a journey of discovery through the history of classical music, in the company of those who have made it and are still making it: the greatest composers of yesterday and today. In these fictitious interviews, they tell us about their lives and works, giving us a better understanding of the context in which they contributed to the world's musical edifice.
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Composer of the month: Antonín Dvořák
I have composed over 180 works. I'm recognized as the greatest Czech composer of my time. So why do I always have this drop of sweat running down my back? Why do my hands tremble? It's March 31, 1901. I look at my watch. In just a few minutes, my opera, Rusalka, will sound.
I watch the musicians intently. My eyes linger on one of the violinists who, with closed eyelids, is taking advantage of these last minutes of respite to concentrate. As if to escape my own apprehension, the sight of the violin takes me back years, to the banks of the Vtalva, in Nelahozeves.
I was born in this small village north of Prague. My parents ran a butcher's shop and inn. My father was an amateur musician, but it wasn't really him who passed this passion on to me. He wanted me to take over the family butcher's shop. Even though I started playing the violin at a very young age with the village teacher, my knowledge of music didn't go beyond what I practiced in church and at the inn's dances. So my father sent me to study German in neighboring towns, a language that was indispensable for doing business. I didn't like it.
My former teachers had certainly already noticed my inclination for music, so they urged me to pursue a career in this field, and managed to convince my father to let me. At the age of sixteen, in the autumn of 1857, I entered the Prague Organ School.
Two years later I graduated as second best student. After spending some time playing in bars and brasseries, I became a violist for opera performances at the Théâtre provisoire. This was what launched my career, for two reasons. The first was that the pit at this theater quickly became a kind of composition school. I learned an enormous amount about music and its creation. Secondly, it was also where I met Bedrich Smetana.
My admiration for him was almost boundless. He took me under his wing, trained me and became one of my greatest friends. A friend, but also an ally, for it was he who introduced me to Prague's artistic and cultural circles.
Slavonic dances
Antonín Dvořák wrote the Slavonic Dances in 1878. At that time, he had just become close to the publisher Simrock, who commissioned the dances. Not knowing where to start, Dvořák took Brahms' Hungarian Dances as a model. Only as a model, since the two works have little in common. For example, Brahms based his work on real, typical Hungarian melodies, whereas Dvořák took only rhythms from traditional Slavonic music - the melodies being entirely his own. This work was so successful that Simrock commissioned a second set in 1878 (Slavonic Dances, op.72).
The Slavonic Dances consist of eight pieces based on folk dance rhythms. The first, for example, is a furiant, a high-energy Czech dance. This first dance resembles a typical passage from Bedrich Smetana's The Bride Sold. The second dance is a Ukrainian dumka, the third a Czech polka and the fourth a Czech sousedska.
These pieces are typical of Dvořák's style. Indeed, what is most notable about this composition is that at no point does Dvořák "quote" traditional Slavic music, but honors it, evoking its style and spirit by using rhythmic and structural formulas specific to that music. This is yet another testimony to Antonín Dvořák's incredible mastery and artistic and personal identity.
The first notes of Rusalka ring out. That little cello motif, as mischievous as it is mysterious. Then the lyrical flight of the strings. Everything is going swimmingly for the moment. On this string motif, I remember myself bent over my desk, scribbling notes on a staff. I was often dissatisfied with my work, and it wasn't unusual for me to throw entire movements in the garbage can.
For a long time, I composed in secret. I was never happy with my creations, and perhaps I needed time to build up my own style. My music was subject to many influences, sometimes even opposing ones! A little German Romanticism, sprinkled with the new aesthetics of Lizst and Wagner, with an aroma of Czech language and tradition and, of course, the gigantism of Smetana. This - admittedly haphazard - mixture gave rise to the unique sound of my music.
During these years I composed my patriotic cantata Hymnus, which was premiered in 1873 and won me recognition from Prague's cultural milieu. This support gave me wings. I left my post as violist to become organist at St. Adalbert's Church in Prague, so that I could devote more time to composition. Shortly afterwards, I married Anna Cermakova. It's hard for me to admit, but it was with a heavy heart that I tied the knot with Anna. In fact, it was her sister, Josefina, with whom I had fallen in love, but she preferred someone else.
Romantic pieces
The Romantic Pieces by Dvořák were written in January 1887 and premiered on March 30 of the same year in Prague. They consist of four pieces that are actually arrangements of his Miniatures, a trio for violins and viola. There is little difference between the two, apart from four additional bars in the third movement and a minor harmonic reworking of bars 30 to 36 in the first movement.
The first movement, though fast-paced, is relatively calm. Only towards the middle of the movement does it become full of passion. The second movement is very upbeat, with relatively simple harmonic variations. As is often the case with Dvořák, there are influences from traditional Slavic music. The third movement could be described as dreamy, while the fourth is certainly the one that will require the most work!
The last notes of Act I of Rusalka ring out. The brass fills the hall with a heroic cadence, supported by furious cymbals.
Silence.
Act II opens with a bold brass theme, taken up by the strings, leading to the tenor's dramatic entrance. This adventurous melody takes me back a few years, to when my career really took off.
Having achieved a certain degree of public recognition, in 1875 I entered my Symphony No. 3 in a competition to win a grant. Living in abject poverty, the grant did me a great deal of good, and brought me to the attention of Johannes Brahms, who was a member of the jury at the time.
Having become my friend, I sent him thirteen Chants Moraves in 1878, which he entrusted to his publisher. This spread my fame throughout Europe. You might think that this success made this period of my life a happy one, but it was far from it.
On September 21, 1875, my newborn daughter Josefa died. On August 13, 1877, my daughter Ruzena died. On September 8, 1877, my eldest son, Otokar, also died. It is said that the most beautiful works are written in misfortune: in 1877 I completed my Stabat Mater. There's a piece of me in this work. It was this work that, in the space of a few years, brought me international fame. Intercontinental even.
Then everything accelerated: from 1884 onwards, I toured the UK. I was destined to become a butcher. In 1892, I was brought to America and appointed Director of the New York Conservatory.
New World Symphony
The New World Symphony is certainly Dvořák's best-known work, if not one of the world's best-known symphonies. It is his ninth (and last) symphony. He composed it in 1893 and premiered it in December of that year with the New York Philharmonic. It is so named because it falls within the period of Dvořák's life during which he lived in America.
This composition is entirely representative of Dvořák's approach to creation. Indeed, Dvořák was inspired to compose by the land he walked on. If in most of his music we hear the resonance of his native land, in this symphony we perceive heavy influences from the American music of the time. For example, the third movement is inspired by a festive scene in the Song of Hiawatha (an epic poem by Henry Wadsworth Longfellow, symbolic of American literature) in which the Indians dance.
The first movement is one of great nobility. An extremely well-known theme, used in many works of popular culture, is grandly delivered by the brass. The second movement is certainly the symphony's most beautiful: the English horn develops a nostalgic theme taken up by the strings, followed by a quivering motif from the flutes and oboes, followed by a lament from the clarinets reminiscent of Hiawatha's funeral and finally, very unexpectedly and cutting short this sadness, the oboe launches into a song that brings gaiety and freshness back to the movement. The third is a completely traditional scherzo, inspired by Hiawatha but with influences from Dvořák's homeland. The final movement is divided between a combative brass theme and a lyrical clarinet theme taken up by the strings. Little by little, motifs from the preceding movements reappear, clashing and intertwining, culminating in the climax of the initial theme.
The New World Symphony is one of those eternal works that you'll never tire of listening to. If you listen carefully, you'll see that it's actually everywhere. From Gainsbourg to Jaws, from video games to the Statue of Liberty audio guide (track 203). A timeless work that has never been so aptly named: Neil Armstrong took a recording of it with him on the Apollo 11 mission in 1969, which landed the first man on the Moon.
Act II of Rusalka leaves the audience speechless. I watch the reactions carefully. It has to be said that this part of the work is particularly dramatic. Rusalka is in love with a prince, and the prince with a foreign princess. In a final burst of hope, Rusalka throws herself into the arms of the prince, who rejects her. It all comes down to an exceptional soaring performance by soprano Růžena Maturová, resolved by a shattering orchestra. Everyone holds their breath.
Silence.
The first notes of the final act ring out. An eerie carpet of strings sends shivers down the spine of the audience. I love Rusalka's story. On the one hand, it reminds me of the one-sided love I had with Josefina, my wife's sister. And secondly, it's reminiscent of a legend from my homeland.
I've always insisted that my music should honor my cultural heritage. The dotted rhythms and syncopations of Bohemian and Moravian dances run through it. The soul of my nation, the soul of my people, is deeply rooted in my artistic language. My piqués trace the spikes of Prague Castle. My symphonies draw their power from the beauty of St. Barbara's Church in Kutna Hora. My cadences have the complex nature of the Besedice labyrinth.
After two years in America, I returned to Prague, a famous city. I taught at the Prague Conservatory and continued composing. It was at this point that I began writing Rusalka.
American Quartet
Dvořák wrote the String Quartet No. 12 in F majorin the summer of 1893, while still in the United States. Like the New World Symphony, this is one of Dvořák's best-known pieces of chamber music. It evokes America, but also Central Europe, as he wrote it while in the town of Spillville, Iowa, a place with a large Czech population.
The four movements (Allegro ma non troppo, Lento, Molto vivace and Finale vivace ma non troppo) were written in less than a week, and the whole composition took no more than two weeks. The perfect marriage of American and Czech music can be felt in this work. The pentatonic scales of the first movement and the dreamy lyricism of the Lento bring an undeniable light to the piece. At the climax of the third movement, Dvořák reproduces the song of the Scarlet Tanager, a warbler he heard in his garden.
The dazzling beauty of the final bars is a reminder that this work is deeply marked by nostalgia for the homeland. The Czechs living in this region, most of them farmers, were imbued with this very nostalgia, and would enjoy Dvořák's music in church, recalling the landscapes of their native land.
Here we are, the final song of Act III: "Líbej mne, líbej, mír mi prej". The singer proclaims these words as if they were her own. "Kiss me, kiss me, peace be upon me". In a final burst she exclaims "by tone love, by your beauty, my destiny is marked", then, in a majestic crescendo, "may God bless you, may God bless you". In the velvet of the strings, the opera ends calmly, as if soothed.
Rusalka was Antonín Dvořák's last real success, and remains one of his most famous works today. He died on May 1, 1904, at the age of 62. Like his friend Smetana, he is buried in the Vyšehrad cemetery, on a hill overlooking Prague. He left behind no fewer than 189 works. His music is unique, colorful and rhythmic. He is one of the few Romantic composers to have successfully tackled all styles (with the exception of ballet). Less than a month before his death, a final tribute was paid to him at the first Czech Music Festival, whose program was devoted almost entirely to his work. Thousands of spectators turned out to applaud his New World Symphony. Unfortunately, he was too tired from illness to attend.
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