The Slovak Philharmonic Orchestra

Programme:

B. Smetana, Moldau

E. Suchon, Three Songs for Bass and Orchestra

A. Dvořák, Symphony No. 7 in D minor, Op. 70

Vltava (Moldau) is the second and best known tone poem from Smetana’s cycle Má Vlast (My Homeland). The composition is a kind of rondo, which, with its distinctive and continuously growing musical motive, is a realistic tone painting of the landscape and the life of the people on the banks of the river.

Composer Eugen Suchon counts amongst the most important representatives of contemporary Slovak music. In his music he combines the principles of modern harmony with modality and the folklore heritage. On the centenary of the composer’s birth we will hear one of his last works, Three Songs for Bass and Orchestra.

We have already written enough about the confusion that the publisher Simrock caused regarding the chronological order of Dvořák’s symphonies. The Seventh Symphony (previously labelled the Second) was written in 1884, on a commission from the London Philharmonic Society. It is a masterful work of extraordinary colour and formal rigour, held by many in higher regard than the famous Ninth (From the New World).