Dvorak: In Nature's Realm Overture, Op. 91

Many of the titles on this 2CD set formed couplings to Kertész’s celebrated LSO Dvorak symphony cycle for Decca. Collected here, over two generously-filled CDs, are all of the Overtures and Tone Poems of Dvorak that Kertész recorded. The fantastical, sometimes gruesome fairy tales of Erben exercised a curious fascination over Dvořák and three of his series of four Erben-inspired symphonic poems are recorded here in interpretations that capture every nuance and thrill of the stories. Also included is Kertész’s celebrated recording of the Symphonic Variations, full of invention through the 27 variations, and the Scherzo capriccioso, with its unmistakable Bohemian flavour.

The second volume of the first complete cycle of Dvorák symphonies on Warner Classics.

Recorded at the Lighthouse, Poole, 21st / 22nd September 2011 by producer and engineer Phil Rowlands

Zuill Bailey’s recording of J.S. Bach's Suites for Solo Cello (TEL3197802) was released in 2010 and went straight to the top of the “Billboard” classical chart.

Last year he brought out a critically acclaimed CD devoted to music for cello and piano by Brahms (TEL3266402). This, his latest release, features one of the most enduring works in the romantic repertoire, Antonin Dvorak’s Cello Concerto. The orchestra on the disc, which also includes two of the composer’s Symphonic Poems “The Water Goblin” and “In Nature’s Realm”, is the Indianapolis Symphony and the conductor is Jun Märkl.

Zuill Bailey made his Telarc debut early in early 2009 with a CD called “Russian Masterpieces for Cello”, a disc which featured music by Tchaikovsky and Shostakovich.

Towards the end of last year he joined forces with pianist Simone Dinnerstein in a critically acclaimed recording of Beethoven’s complete works for piano and cello. Since then his recording of J S Bach’s cello suites has been a massive success particularly in the USA where it spent four weeks in a row at No. 1 on the Billboard classical chart, and even made the top 30 in the New Artists chart.

Antonin Dvorak’s Cello Concerto in B minor, Op. 104, B. 191 was written in 1894–1895 for his friend, the cellist Hanuš Wihan. Dvořák wrote the concerto while in New York during his third term as the Director of the National Conservatory.

The names of Bedřich Smetana, Antonín Dvořák, Leoš Janáček and Bohuslav Martinů are rightly synonymous with the global fame of Czech music. And it was frequently the compositions inspired by the beauty of the beloved homeland (and its folk music) that brought its creators to the attention of listeners worldwide.

A case in point is Smetana’s My Country, yet other composers too reflected the land of their heart, its natural and folk motifs in their works (Janáček’s Lachian Dances, Novák’s Moravian-Slovak Suite, Dvořák’s Czech Suite, Martinů’s Bouquet of Flowers, etc.). Bohemian Impressions is a selection of the most beautiful melodies that grew out of this inspiration – a gallery of images and reminiscences from the places where one feels most alive and keeps returning to.

Amid the wide harmonies – how wide are the horizons seen from the Vysočina hills? – flash the sparks of lively colours with which a composer let himself be carried away by the rhythms of folk dances at a village ball. This is a musical landscape singing of love, colours, scents and tranquillity; a landscape in which you will feel alive. The most beautiful music from Bohemian fields and groves – a landscape of the heart to which we keep returning.

Smetana’s Má vlast (My Country), his magnificent cycle of six symphonic poems, embodies both Czech nationhood and the country’s legendary history and was written when he was at the height of his creative powers.

The cycle is lyrical, warm-hearted and dramatic with its exciting tales of heroic warriors, visions of the wide open Bohemian countryside, and the surging river Vitava that runs through it. The sweeping romantic melodies and the splendour of the triumphant brass are full of passionate patriotic feelings.

The accompanying work on this 2-CD set also celebrates the Czech countryside: Dvorˇák’s overture ‘In Nature’s Realm’. This picturesque evocation of the composer’s home in the spruce forests of Bohemia is part of a trilogy, its closing epilogue featuring a chorale-like motif based on a Czech hymn.

Booklet essay

Recordings made in 1991 and 1992

The Vienna Philharmonic has a rich and notable performance history of these ever-popular symphonies.

Antonin Dvorak’s (1841-1904) reputation as a symphonist finally established itself with the publication of his 5th and 6th symphonies, and the triumphant reception accorded to his greatest symphony the 7th. The 8th is a lighter, sunnier work and was an immediate success, especially in the UK where Dvorak enjoyed a good press and public adulation, and the work had for a short time of ‘The English’ – odd considering it is full of lively Czech and Bohemian dance rhythms.

The 9th symphony is both an American and a Czech symphony. Dvorak commented that upon discovering Negro melodies ‘I discover all that is necessary for a great and noble school of music’. He was also at the time of the 9th’s composition, staying at the small American town of Spillville (300 inhabitants), which had a large émigré Czech community. Although surrounded by people from his homeland, he longed to return home, and a nostalgic feeling permeates the score alongside the influences of Native American themes and Negro spirituals. What the 9th lacks in terms of structure compared with Nos. 6 and 7 it makes up for in sheer melodic riches. It has been a concert-hall favourite since its premiere in New York in 1893.

Dvorak abandoned the symphony after 1893, and embarked on a series of tone poems that contain some of his most remarkable music, and foreshadow the later tone poems of both Sibelius and Strauss, as well as the sound world of Janác?ek. The Noonday Witch together with the other 3 works in the series are all based on Czech folk tales – often brutal and scary. In this work, the mother tries to quieten her baby saying that the noonday witch will come for the baby as punishment if it won’t stop crying… the baby continues to cry, the witch appears and strikes both mother and child dead.

The Dortmund Philharmonic is 120 years old, yet this is the orchestra’s recording debut. Under their new general music director Jac van Steen, they shine in a fabulous rendering of Dvorák’s sixth symphony together with his three rarely performed Concert Overtures. A fantastic debut disc.

Dvorák’s overtures In Nature’s Realm and Carnival, completed in 1892, need no introduction. The case, however, is different with Symphony in E major, which Suk began composing a mere five years later, as Dvorák’s pupil. The symphony is – notwithstanding the composer’s tender age, 23 – a manifestation of absolute artistic maturity and independence. In 1899 the work was premiered by the Czech Philharmonic Orchestra conducted by Oskar Nedbal.