Antonin DVOŘÁK (1841-1904)

• Serenade for Winds in d minor, Op. 44

Antonin Dvořák was born in Nelahozeves, Bohemia, in 1841, son of a butcher. Although his father intended him to learn the family trade, Dvořák showed early talent as a violinist. He was soon sent for music lessons and began his career as a performing violist, sometimes playing under the composer Bedrich Smetana. As a young composer, he was highly influenced by the German composer Richard Wagner but when he won the Austrian State Stipendium in 1875, he was heard by Johannes Brahms – the arch enemy of Wagner, who went on to introduce the younger composer to his own publisher, Simrock. By the end of the 1870s, Dvořák’s music began to show influences from Brahms’ classicism. During this period, one could also hear the Czech nationalistic style such as from his Slavonic Dances (1878), which were to secure him worldwide fame. In 1892, Dvořák went to the USA as Director of the newly founded National Conservatory in New York where his most famous works, the 9thSymphony ‘From the New World’ and the ‘American’ String Quartet’. He returned to Czechoslovakia in 1895 and taught at the Prague Conservatory, becoming its Director in 1901. He died three years later.

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