Bachtrack top ten: Antonín Dvořák

“It would be wonderful if the major ideas that occur to me were like the ones that occur to Dvořák simply in passing.” Johannes Brahms’ verdict on the music of Antonín Dvořák was often extremely positive. The German composer sat on the 1874 jury of the Austrian State Stipendium with the renowned – and often waspish – critic Eduard Hanslick to award financial support to talented young composers. Dvořák was successful, winning the stipend three times. In 1877, Brahms was so impressed that he recommended his music to Fritz Simrock, his publisher, which turned out to be financially lucrative, including the commissioning of the two sets of Slavonic Dances. 

Dvořák was one of the young Bohemian composers following in the footsteps of Bedřich Smetana in establishing a national identity in Czech music. Born in 1841 in Nelahozeves, a village near the River Vltava, north of Prague, Dvořák studied violin as a child, although his father wanted him to go into the family business as a butcher. František Dvořák eventually agreed to Antonín becoming a musician, on the condition that he train for a career as an organist. At the age of 12, he moved to live with an aunt and uncle in Zlonice, where he studied piano, organ and harmony, composing his first works, including polkas. 

While Dvořák’s compositions were heard around Prague, the Viennese stipendium and the support of Brahms helped widen his renown. Joseph Joachim was a great fan of his chamber music and Dvořák dedicated his Violin Concerto to him (although Joachim ended up never performing it). His music was popular in England – commissions included the Seventh Symphony and the cantata The Spectre’s Bride – but it was his move to America that sealed his celebrity. 

In 1891, he accepted the role of Director of the National Conservatory of Music in New York, which brought him to international attention. Moreover, it allowed Dvořák the chance to soak up the music scene in America, including the study of folk music and African-American spirituals, which influenced compositions such as his Ninth Symphony, subtitled “From the New World”, and his “American” String Quartet. 

Despite his fame, Dvořák remained a humble, religious man and a great lover of nature. He was also a committed trainspotter, once declaring, “I’d give all my symphonies if I could have invented the locomotive!”

1Symphony no. 8 in G major, Op.88

All nine Dvořák’s symphonies are rooted in Bohemian soil, with Czech dance rhythms and nature to the fore. Of the last three symphonies, the Eighth is my favourite, being particularly upbeat and bucolic. The third movement is a wistful waltz, paving the way for a rousing finale. The famous Czech conductor Rafael Kubelík, rehearsing that finale, said of the opening trumpet fanfare: “Gentlemen, in Bohemia the trumpets never call to battle – they always call to the dance!” 

2Rusalka

Dvořák knew opera well, having played in the pit for a decade in the 1860s. He composed ten operas, but it’s only Rusalka that is widely performed today. It’s a moving “lyric fairy tale” about a water nymph who wishes to become human so she can win the love of a Prince she has seen by her lake. The witch Ježibaba grants Rusalka’s wish – on the condition that once she is human, she will be unable to speak to her prince. If she fails to win his love, she will be cursed forever; if the Prince rejects her, he will be eternally damned. It doesn’t end well. 

The plot soaks up the Romantic supernaturalism of Friedrich de la Motte Fouqué’s novella Undine and Hans Christian Andersen’s The Little Mermaid. Rusalka’s Song to the Moon is the opera’s hit number, but the whole work is gorgeously written from first note to last. 

3Cello Concerto in B minor, Op.104

Dvořák had his doubts about the cello. “The cello is a beautiful instrument, but its place is in the orchestra and in chamber music. As a solo instrument it isn’t much good.” Thankfully, he revised his opinion. Possibly the greatest cello concerto (sorry, Elgar!), Dvořák’s was composed during his American years. Symphonic in scope, it covers a range of emotions, especially the melancholy slow movement where Dvořák quotes a favourite song of his sister-in-law, Josefina Kaunitzová, who had died soon after his return to Bohemia. The finale is full of high spirits, possibly anticipating Dvořák’s imminent return home. Brahms wrote to congratulate him on the score. “How could I not have known that one can write a cello concerto like this? If I had known, I would have written one long ago!”

4Symphony no. 9 in E minor, “From the New World”, Op.95

“The Americans expect great things of me,” wrote Dvořák. “Above all, I am to show them the way into the Promised Land, into the realms of a new independent art – in short, to create a national music.” He began composing his Ninth Symphony within a few months of his arrival in New York, after he’d been given a copy of Henry Wadsworth Longfellow’s poem The Song of Hiawatha. Yet too often the word “from” is missed from the work’s subtitle. Yes, it was written in America and the theme of the famous Largo does sound as if it was inspired by an African-American spiritual, but it’s as much a homesick letter to Bohemia, music with a heavy Czech accent. 

5Slavonic Dances, Op.46 

Brahms’ publisher Simrock, keen to follow up the success of his Hungarian Dances, commissioned a set of Slavonic Dances, hoping the piano duet scores would sell like hot cakes. Whereas Brahms used traditional folk melodies, Dvořák’s are entirely his own, although drawing on Czech folk rhythms. Dvořák was later commissioned to compose a second set, which proved as popular as the first, although it’s the Op.46 dances that are performed most often. 

6Symphony no. 7 in D minor, Op.70

The Seventh is perhaps the most dramatic of Dvořák’s symphonies, dark and sombre at the beginning before growing more vigorous, full of Bohemian spirit. It was commissioned by the London Philharmonic Society in 1884. “My new symphony,” Dvořák wrote to a friend, “must be such as to make a stir in the world.” There are folk-like moments and the third movement Scherzo echoes the composer’s popular Slavonic Dances. 

7String Quartet no. 12 “American”, Op.96

Dvořák composed this beloved string quartet during a holiday in Spillville, Iowa, during his first summer break of his National Conservatory of Music tenure. It was an area where many Czech emigrants lived. After many months in the big city, he was now surrounded by nature and was in good spirits. That sense of ease is felt in the string quartet he wrote there, which is said to draw on African American and Native American music (hence it’s “American” nickname). “I know that I would never have written my new symphony, or the String Quartet in F major, or the quintet here in Spillville, if I had never seen America!”

8Piano Quintet no. 2 in A major, Op.81

Dvořák composed an early piano quintet in the 1870s, a work with which he was never satisfied. He attempted to revise it in 1887, but set about composing another quintet instead – in the same key – which is one of the finest works of the genre, almost fusing Czech melodies with the Austro-German tradition of Brahms’ Piano Quintet. The second movement is a non-traditional dumka, a slavic style of instrumental music featuring sudden changes from melancholy to exuberance which helps elicit a folk feel. 

9Othello, Op.93

Othello was the third of three concert overtures composed in 1891 originally titled Nature, Life, and Love. He eventually split the trilogy and retitled them In Nature’s Realm, Carnival and Othello. Brahms offered to do the proof-reading and to correct the galleys and singled out Othello as being particularly admirable. It is a brilliant evocation of Shakespeare’s play, dark, brooding and passionate. There’s no evidence I’m aware of, but I sometimes wonder if Dvořák had heard Verdi’s Otello before composing his overture, particularly the double-bass writing when Otello appears in Act 4 after Desdemona has said her prayers. 

10Serenade for Winds, Op.44

In May 1879, Johannes Brahms wrote to the violinist Joseph Joachim, “Take a look at Dvorák’s Serenade for Wind Instruments; I hope you will enjoy it as much as I do. It would be difficult to discover a finer, more refreshing impression of really abundant and charming creative talent.” The serenade is composed for a standard wind ensemble with the addition of a cello and double bass. I’ve a real soft spot for it. There are echoes of Mozart’s wind serenades, but this is essentially outdoor music, bucolic and earthy. Indeed, I once heard the Philharmonia play it in the courtyard of Somerset House, the audience sitting in deckchairs, the music accompanied by enthusiastic seagulls. 

This article was sponsored by the Year of Czech Music.