14 GYPSY MELODIES Immediately after, Dvořák composed another song cycle, choosing to set to music the first work by Czech poet Adolf Heyduk (1835-1923) and retaining its title: Cigánské melodie (Gypsy Melodies). Yet again this was a commission for the tenor Gustav Walter (1834-1910), a member of the Vienna Opera, to whom the work was dedicated. The composer therefore adapted the songs directly to a German translation of the poems, produced for the purpose by Heyduk himself. The publication of the German version by the Berlin publisher Simrock excited certain sensitivities in Bohemia. Dvořák only managed to allay this later, when the Cigánské melodie with Czech texts were published. Jiří Kabát's instrumental arrangement, presented on this album, can therefore be seen as an test to see whether Dvořák's two famous works can make an impression even without words. While Dvořák was vaguely inspired by folk music for his own compositions, his young colleague and composer friend Leoš Janáček (1854-1928) proceeded differently. He had been interested in folk song all his life. He first learned about it in his hometown of Hukvaldy, on the border between Moravia and Silesia, then systematically studied it from published collections, preferring to learn it first-hand. He traveled through the countryside to meet singers, dancers, and folk groups, noting down the music wherever it was sung and danced. He saw in folk songs the complete essence of humanity: body, soul, and way of life. The composer sought to preserve this ancestral heritage.
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