Phone

Tablet - Portrait

Tablet - Landscape

Desktop

Antonín Dvorák

Dvorák composed this music in 1879 and revised it twice, in 1880 and 1882. Frantisek Ondricek played the premiere on October 14, 1883, with the composer conducting. Herr Doktor Professor Joseph Joachim never hesitated to "correct" concertos that younger composers submitted for his approval. From Max Bruch's in G minor in 1865, he graduated to Brahms' D major in 1878, then to Dvorák's A minor toward the end of 1879. But Joachim didn't just revise solo parts; he suggested changes in musical structure and orchestration that Bruch obsequiously obeyed, with the upshot that his -- and Brahms' -- were introduced to the world by Joachim. Not Dvorák's, though, despite a dedication to Herr Doktor Professor as well as revisions that the violinist deemed essential. (Joachim, in passing, was a proficient composer without being in any way distinctive, vide a violin concerto "in the Hungarian manner.") He waited two years before acknowledging Dvorák's changes, then wanted more ("some passages...were too difficult to perform"), chiding Dvorák, who was both a violinist and a violist, for "not having played in some time." Joachim allowed that he "was pleased by the many true beauties of your work, which it will be a pleasure for me to perform," doubting in the next breath that "in its present shape ripe for the public, especially because of its orchestral accompaniment, which is still rather heavy." Herr Doktor Professor invited Dvorák to Berlin for a play-through by the student orchestra at his Hochschule für Musik. A representative of the composer's Berlin-based publisher, Fritz Simrock, also attended, and had his own criticisms to add. Exasperated by now and not a little offended, Dvorák insisted the piece be published instanter. When this was done, he sought someone else to play the premiere. Although for the rest of the nineteenth century, the concerto was as popular as Beethoven's (even more so than Brahms'), Joachim never did play it. Just as certain structural innovations in the Bruch G minor had put him off, Dvorák's even freer, more imaginative approach to form was disturbing.

Rather than a heaven-storming first movement, an ameliorative Adagio and an insouciant finale, Dvorák dispensed with any long orchestral introduction (as Mendelssohn's had done 35 years earlier, and Bruch, too). He also abbreviated the first-movement reprise (Allegro ma non troppo in common time), and wrote a 13-bar transition (quasi moderato) that connected it to the second movement (Adagio ma non troppo in triple meter). Although F major is the root key of his sweetly reflective Romanza, Dvorák takes us on expressive side trips into D (major and minor), E, and A flat major.

Most probably, the sticking point for Joachim (not above being a fogy) was Dvorák's elaborate, intricate, uniquely Czech finale -- a hybrid sonatina-rondo that starts with a recurring main-theme furiant in A major (Allegro giocoso, ma non troppo, 3/8 time). Four subsections celebrate the composer's national heritage, reminding us that he composed the first book of Slavonic Dances, Op. 46/1-8, a year before he undertook he violin concerto. The first of these is in F sharp major, but more striking is a D minor dumka in 2/4 time halfway through, in which a sun-dappled sky until this moment suddenly clouds over. But the key is A major, and the mood subsequently ebullient when this material repeats. More furiant follows before a high-spirited coda.