Download String Quartet in F major, American

11-26 Fischer.qxp_Layout 1 11/17/16 12:47 PM Page 26
Notes on the Program
By James M. Keller, Program Annotator, The Leni and Peter May Chair
String Quartet in F major, Op. 96, American
Symphony No. 8 in G major, Op. 88
Antonín Dvořák
wo of Antonín Dvořák’s chamber
pieces share the same nickname: the
American String Quartet (Op. 96) and
the American String Quintet (Op. 97), although the name is less de rigueur for the
latter. The nickname comes from the fact
that Dvořák composed these works while
he was living in the United States, a period that also saw the creation of his
Symphony No. 9, From the New World
(Op. 95). All three of these pieces were
premiered in the United States; the Quartet and Quintet were unveiled in Boston
and the symphony by the New York Philharmonic in New York, where Dvořák
served as director of the National Conservatory of Music from 1892 to 1895.
Dvořák had some exposure to Native
American music during his time in the
United States. In the spring of 1893 he attended one of Buffalo Bill Cody’s Wild
West shows in New York, which would
have included a fair amount of more or
less authentic singing and dancing from
a group of Oglala Sioux. (These particular
Indians, as it happened, hailed from the
Pine Ridge reservation in the Dakota Territory, which just two years earlier had
been the location of the notorious massacre at Wounded Knee.) A few months
later, during his summer vacation in
Spillville, Iowa, Dvořák encountered
performers of a different tradition at a
performance given by the Kickapoo Medicine Company. (The Kickapoos, originally centered in what is now southern
Michigan, northwest Ohio, and northeast
T
26 | NEW YORK PHILHARMONIC
Indiana, were by that time mostly in Oklahoma and Kansas.) But for all his interest
in cultural diversity, Dvořák was not in
IN SHORT
Born: September 8, 1841, in Nelahozeves,
near Kralupy, Bohemia
Died: May 1, 1904, in Prague
Works composed and premiered: American
String Quartet, composed June 8–25, 1893, in
Spillville, Iowa; premiered January 1, 1894, in
Boston, Massachusetts, by the Kneisel Quartet (violinists Franz Kneisel and Otto Roth,
violist Louis Svècenski, and cellist Alwin
Schroeder). Symphony No. 8, composed
August 26–November 8, 1889, in Prague; dedicated to the Czech Academy of the Emperor
Franz Joseph for Sciences, Literature, and
Arts; premiered February 2, 1890, by the
National Theatre Orchestra in Prague, with
the composer conducting
New York Philharmonic premieres and
most recent performances: American String
Quartet premiered April 9, 1922, by members
of the New York Symphony (which merged
with the New York Philharmonic in 1928),
Sandor Harmati, Wolfe Wolfinsohn, violin;
Nicholas Moldovan, viola; Emmeran Stoeber,
cello; most recently performed October 11,
2014, Michelle Kim, Lisa Kim, violin; Rebecca
Young, viola; Eileen Moon, cello. Symphony
No. 8, premiered March 12, 1892, Anton Seidl,
conductor; most recently played, March 1,
2016, Christoph Eschenbach, conductor
Estimated durations: American String
Quartet, ca. 27 minutes; Symphony No. 8,
ca. 38 minutes
11-26 Fischer.qxp_Layout 1 11/17/16 12:47 PM Page 27
any sense an ethnomusicologist. He was
happy to derive folkish inspiration at
arm’s length and subsume it into his
own artistic vocabulary. This was common practice in the 1890s, when numerous composers provided American
audiences with a repertoire of purportedly ethnic music gussied up in concertdress clothes.
It is widely held that some of the
sounds Dvořák heard at those performances by Native Americans worked their
way into both of his American chamber
pieces, although debate swirls around
how deep his indebtedness was. Nearly
all the themes of the Op. 96 String Quartet are pentatonic melodies, including
the two principal themes of the first
movement — the first announced
staunchly by viola against a shimmering
accompaniment, the second offered
more hesitatingly by second violin.
These may sound somehow “Indian”
but, in truth, five-note scales are redolent
of any number of folk musics. It might be
argued that such melodies may be considered every bit as much Czech as
American, and one is tempted to wonder
whether a specifically Native American
connection would occur to most listeners were it not for the work’s nickname.
Having spent many years as an orchestral violist, Dvořák left a thoughtful
legacy to the viola players of posterity: it
Sources and Inspirations
At the end of his first year heading the National Conservatory in New York, Dvořák
traveled with his family to Spillville, Iowa, an
agricultural community whose small population included a large Czech component.
It was there, surrounded by the dual cultural influences of Czech traditions and the
American Midwest, that he composed his
American Quartet and Quintet. Work on the
quartet proceeded quickly, as was his wont.
He apparently set down sketches for this
quartet for three days beginning on June 8, 1893 (three
days after his arrival in town), and then completed the first
movement on June 15, the second on the 17th, the third on
the 20th, and the fourth on the 25th. One can only marvel at
the pace Dvořák was able to maintain when in the flush
of inspiration.
From top: Dvořák’s summer residence of 1893 is now
the Bily Clocks Museum, which houses early-20th century
timepieces carved by local farmers Frank and Joseph Bily; a clock
dedicated to the Czech composer
NOVEMBER 2016 | 27
11-26 Fischer.qxp_Layout 1 11/17/16 12:47 PM Page 28
is remarkable how often he gives that instrument the honor of announcing
themes. A fine example comes at the outset of this quartet, where the violins and
cello ease the piece into existence by
defining nothing more than a chord, with
the viola entering last, enunciating the
principal melody with husky richness.
Following the classically worked-out first
movement, the second (Lento) is a hyperRomantic reverie with touches of harmonic suspension adding to its yearning
quality; the French musicologist Pierre
Barbier has cunningly referred to this
movement as a sort of “Bohemian
blues.” The third movement is a dancelike scherzo (again with a pentatonic
theme), with the principal section
alternating with a variant on itself to create an alternating A–B–A–B–A form.
Dvořák reported that some violin figuration in the middle of the A sections represents a transcription of the song of the
scarlet tanager, which he heard at
Spillville. Good humor reigns over the
Finale, although halfway through the
music slows down and assumes a pious
attitude, presumably echoing the
singing of a hymn — perhaps at the
Church of St. Václav in Spillville, where
Dvořák sometimes played the organ
during his summer vacation.
As a child, Antonín Dvořák revealed
nothing resembling precocious musical
talent. Although his family was poor,
Dvořák did study music with the local
schoolmaster and, later, with an organist in a nearby town. In 1857 he entered
the Prague Organ School, where he re-
View and Reviews
In his informed and approachable 1984 biography Dvořák, the German conductor and musicologist Hans-Hubert Schönzeler offers some precise insights into the Symphony No. 8:
This G major Symphony (Op. 88) is certainly the most intimate and original within the whole
canon of Dvořák’s nine. … [Dvořák] himself has said that he wanted to write a work different from
the other symphonies, “with individual force worked out in a new way,” and in this he certainly
succeeded, even though perhaps in the Finale his Bohemian temperament got the better of him.
It may lack some of those characteristics which we are accustomed to associate with the term
“symphony,” and … it is surprising that people who love giving works descriptive tags have not
called [it] the “Idyllic.” … When one walks in those forests surrounding Dvořák’s country home on
a sunny summer’s day, with the birds
singing and the leaves of trees rustling in
a gentle breeze, one can virtually hear the
music. … [The] last movement just blossoms out, and I shall never forget [the conductor] Rafael Kubelík in a rehearsal when
it came to the opening trumpet fanfare,
say to the orchestra: “Gentlemen, in Bohemia the trumpets never call to battle —
they always call to the dance!”
Dvořák outside his country home at Vysoká,
near Prague, ca.1890
28 | NEW YORK PHILHARMONIC
11-26 Fischer.qxp_Layout 1 11/17/16 12:47 PM Page 29
ceived a thorough academic grounding
in theory and performance, and soon he
secured a spot as violist in a dance orchestra. The group prospered, and in
1862 its members formed the founding
core of the Provisional Theatre orchestra. Dvořák would play principal viola in
that ensemble for nine years, in which
capacity he sat directly beneath the batons of such conductors as Bedřich
Smetana and Richard Wagner.
During these early years Dvořák also
honed his skills as a composer, and by
1871 he felt compelled to leave the orchestra and devote himself to composing full time. The decision entailed
considerable financial risk, but the aspiring composer eked out a living by
giving piano lessons and (beginning in
1873) playing the organ at St. Adalbert’s
Church in Prague. This turned out to be
a happy choice, since he fell in love with
one of his piano students, Anna Čermáková, whom he married in 1873. The
following year Dvořák received his first
real recognition as a composer: he was
awarded the Austrian State Stipendium,
a grant newly created by the Ministry
of Education to assist young, poor,
gifted musicians — which exactly
defined his status at the time. That he
received the award again in 1876 and
1877 underscores how his financial situation was improving slowly, if at all, in
the mid-1870s.
Dvořák’s lucky break came when the
influential Viennese music critic Eduard Hanslick took a shine to some of
his pieces. In 1877 Hanslick encouraged
him to send some scores to Johannes
Brahms. The more eminent Brahms was
so delighted with what he received that
he recommended Dvořak to his own
publisher, Fritz Simrock, who immediately published Dvořák’s Moravian
Duets, commissioned a collection of
Slavonic Dances, and contracted a first
option on all of the composer’s new
works. If Dvořák had not received this
critical support at the eleventh hour he
might well have given up trying to be a
composer. The world came precariously
close to never hearing his mature masterpieces, such as his great chamber
works and his last four symphonies.
Even so, these late pieces were slow to
make their way into the international
repertoire. Except for the New World
Symphony, Carnival, and the Slavonic
Dances, Dvořák remained rather little
Listen for … the Birdcall
Compared to Dvořák’s somber Seventh Symphony (in D minor), the Eighth (in G major) is decidedly genial and upbeat. And yet, if one listens carefully, it is surprising how much minor-key music
actually inhabits this major-key symphony, beginning with the richly scored, rather mournful introduction in G minor, which the composer added as an afterthought. But even here joyful premonitions intrude, thanks to the birdcall of the solo flute:
This develops into the ebullient principal theme of the movement; and yet, the mournful music of
the introduction keeps returning as the movement progresses.
NOVEMBER 2016 | 29
11-26 Fischer.qxp_Layout 1 11/17/16 12:47 PM Page 30
played outside his native land until
practically the middle of the 20th century. In the Czech Lands, however, he finally enjoyed the respect he deserved by
the time he got around to his Eighth
Symphony, and in 1890 he dedicated it
“for my installation as a member of the
Czech Academy of the Emperor Franz
Joseph for Sciences, Literature, and
Arts,” which inducted him two months
after the premiere.
The publisher, Simrock, had paid
Dvořák 3,000 marks for his Symphony
No. 7 in 1885. When the composer
finished his Eighth Symphony, which
occupied him for about two and a half
months during the late summer and fall
of 1889, the firm offered him only 1,000
marks. The fact is that large-scale works
like symphonies were expensive to publish and hard to market, and Simrock
was understandably more interested in
acquiring smaller-scale pieces, like
piano collections or songs. Nonetheless,
Dvořák considered Simrock’s offer a
huge insult. Negotiations went back and
forth for a year, and when they stalled at
a point Dvořák deemed unsatisfactory,
30 | NEW YORK PHILHARMONIC
the famously pious composer dropped
his publisher a note: “I shall simply do
what beloved God tells me to do. That
will surely be the best thing.”
What God apparently told Dvořák to
do was to have the symphony published
instead by the London firm of Novello,
notwithstanding the fact that doing so
was a flagrant breach of his contract
with Simrock (at least so Simrock
insisted). Eventually, they reconciled
and Dvořák returned to Simrock’s fold.
The circumstances of the publication
gave rise to the fact that dusty volumes
occasionally refer to this symphony as
the “English,” since it appeared on the
imprint of a firm in London. It is a
bizarrely inappropriate nickname for a
work so audibly drenched in what,
thanks in large part to Dvořák, is recognized as incontrovertibly Czech.
Instrumentation: Symphony No. 8
calls for two flutes (one doubling piccolo), two oboes (one doubling English
horn), two clarinets, two bassoons, four
horns, two trumpets, three trombones,
tuba, timpani, and strings.