Smetana: Czech Dances & On the Seashore

Featuring

Garrick Ohlsson
Bedřich Smetana

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Composition History

Some tunes in the second set of Czech Dances were drawn from a collection of Czech songs compiled by Karel Jaromír Erben, published in 1862-4.

Composer Biography

Bedřich Smetana, the composer, began to lose his hearing in 1874 and was completely deaf by 1876, in the midst of composing his tone poems Má vlast.

Composition History

For his second set of Czech Dances, Smetana was inspired by his younger contemporary Dvořák, whose first set of Slavonic Dances was published in 1878.

Composition History

Smetana's "On the seashore-A reminiscence" was composed in 1861 while he was based in Gothenburg, Sweden, and shows stylistic debts to Liszt, whom he regularly contacted.

Composition History

While composing the second set of Czech Dances, Smetana consulted a retired teacher and amateur violinist named Suchý, who demonstrated old Bohemian and Moravian dances.

Composer's Artistic Vision

Leoš Janáček, a successor to Smetana, greatly admired the nationalistic quality of Smetana's music, stating that its "Czechness" was almost measurable.

Composer's Artistic Vision

Smetana aimed to "idealize the polka in particular, as Chopin did with the mazurka," and insisted on keeping "Polkas" in the title of his Czech Dances.