LDV18

Antonín Dvořák knew how to listen to nature. In his mind, the reality of the elements was converted into musical values; he transmuted things from the concrete to the spiritual. Trees, skies, stones, all were songs. The naturalism of village music was transformed into poetic rhythms. The countryside and the earth sang. At nearly forty years old, Dvořák enjoyed such international recognition as a composer that he was buckling under the weight of commissions for new works, and not only for publishers; performers sought him out as well. So it came about that two of the most famous chamber musicians of his time, Jean Becker and Joseph Hellmesberger, asked him for a string quartet – with Becker particularly insisting that it should be written ‘in the Slavonic spirit’. The Quartet in E flat major op.51 (rightly nicknamed ‘Slavonic’) was composed under the influence of Slavonic music. The thematic material, the rhythms, the harmony, all bespeak an inspiration derived from the spirit of folk music, but stylised by Dvořák’s genius. The four movements are written in sonata form with a few liberties as regards traditional practice (for example, the recapitulation of the first movement does not begin with the first theme, but with the second). The second movement is one of the subtlest dumky written by Dvořák, with its two sharply contrasted themes. The third movement, marked ‘Romanza’, is a nocturne in an intimate, dreamy mode. The finale is a stylisation of a skočná , a lively Czech folk dance. The eloquent melodies, the supreme artistry of the composition, and the refinement of its style place this work among the most accomplished quartets in the repertory.