Born and educated near Prague, Jan Dismas Zelenka (1679-1745) eventually took positions in Dresden as a string player and music director. He became an expert on the violone, Baroque cousin of the modern double-bass. At the time Dresden had the best instrumental ensemble in Europe, and Zelenka composed daring, virtuosic music for its performers.  And like Bach, he generally avoided secular vocal composition (i.e., opera) and focused instead on sacred and instrumental music. The brilliance and confidence found in Zelenka’s music have helped spark renewed interest in his life and works since the 1960s. In fact, the first stirrings of a resurgence may be credited to Bedřich Smetana, who programmed Zelenka’s music as far back as 1863.

Zelenka wrote his Concerto a 8 in G Major (“in haste,” according to a note left by the composer) in 1723. Destined most likely for the festivities surrounding the coronation of Charles II in Prague, the multi-movement work follows the form of popular Italian concertos, which consisted of a slow movement sandwiched between two fast movements. Zelenka’s Concerto provides a vast playground for contrasting timbres and textures, moving swiftly between tutti sections (when all instruments play), accompanied solo passages, and sparkling duets between unique pairs. The first movement, whose driving pulse propels us forward, features the solo contributions of the oboe and violins, while the slower second movement widens the spotlight to include the mellower voices of the bassoon and cello. Finally, the breathless pace of the third movement threatens to sweep us off our feet as each of the soloists demonstrate their own virtuosic skill in turn before coming together in a rather abrupt but satisfying ending.

Composer Erwin Schulhoff (1894-1942) was born in Prague and died in a Nazi prison from tuberculosis. Due perhaps to the influence of his great uncle Julius, an accomplished pianist and composer, Schulhoff discovered a predilection for music early in life. Antonín Dvořák himself advocated for the boy to pursue a career in music in 1901, when Erwin was just 7 years old. A period of private instruction was followed by short stints at Prague Conservatory, the Horaksche Klavierschule in Vienna, the Leipzig Conservatory, then the conservatory in Cologne from 1911 to 1914. His musical studies would likely have continued uninterrupted had it not been for conscription into the Austrian army during WWI.

Schulhoff’s four years as a soldier would completely shatter his sense of the world and value systems, leading him to distance himself from the more conservative political values and musical ethos he had previously possessed. Starting in 1919, Schulhoff’s compositions began to reflect his newfound affinity with the Berlin Dadaists, a group of artists who expressed anti-bourgeois and antiwar sentiments through nonsensical satire. Schulhoff was particularly influenced by painter George Grosz, who would play American jazz recordings during gatherings at his home.

Schulhoff started and finished his Concertino for Flute, Viola, and Double Bass in less than a week (May 28-June 1, 1925), inspired by the music he had heard recently at a folk festival in Brno. It premiered at the Donaueschingen Festival for New Music in 1925, with fellow composer Paul Hindemith realizing the part of the viola. The four-movement piece bears evidence of its purported folk inspiration through Slavic rhythms and melodic material, as well as its unique instrumentation, using Western instruments that approximate the traditional timbres of the composer’s original source material. Permeated throughout with Schulhoff’s Expressionism-infused harmonic language, the Concertino commences with a slow movement that acquires momentum and energy for a dynamic exchange between flute and double bass. The second movement, entitled Furiant, follows the style of the so-named Bohemian dance, alternates back and forth between duple and triple meters, and exchanges the flute for the brighter timbres and registers of the piccolo. The third movement sees the return of the flute and a contrapuntal rendition of an old Eastern European lovesong. The Rondino again exchanges piccolo for flute and rounds out the piece with a swirling dance for all three voices in full rustic charm.

Born in Nelahozeves, a small Bohemian village, Antonín Dvořák (1841-1904) grew up in the household of a father whose occupations included those of innkeeper, butcher, and zither player.  Given his proximity to music early in life, Antonín took up the violin as a child. Quite soon he could be found with the village band or alongside church musicians playing the popular repertoire of such ensembles, like waltzes, mazurkas, polkas, and marches.  Turning pen to paper by his late teens, Dvořák followed the lead of nationalist composer Bedřich Smetana in striving toward the formation of a distinctly Czech repertoire – one that paid homage to musical traditions that distinguished Bohemia from its western neighbors.

One work that represents Dvořák’s efforts to blend music indigenous to his Bohemian homeland with the cosmopolitan stylings of Western Europe comes in Zigeunermelodien (Gypsy Songs), a set of seven songs set to German poetry by the Czech poet Adolf Heyduk. Written in the early months of 1880, these songs take inspiration – rather than direct quotation – from the Romani (“Gypsy” is a historical, externally-imposed misnomer), imitating both the subject matter and musical styles believed to be representative of such folk music.  Often romanticizing, even exoticizing, stereotypical attributes of the Romani, these songs center the importance of dance, uninhibited expression of emotions, and the freedom to roam, punctuated by an energetic piano accompaniment.  Despite the engaging appeal of the spirited, dance-based numbers, the most enduring song of the set is slow and mournful. Song No. 4, “Songs My Mother Taught Me,” is a frequent recital piece, receiving heartfelt performances by vocalists and instrumentalists alike over the past century.

Emily Masincup, © 2025