dvořák's American adventures

Some thoughts on

Dvorak in Love: A light-hearted dream
Original title of the Czech edition: Scherzo capriccioso
1984
Josef Škvorecký

I have always been a fan of Antonín Dvořák's works from the American period (1893-1895), including his cello concerto in B minor, the New World symphony, the American quartet, the Sonatina, and the humoresque. I did not however, have a very clear view of how this body of work came into being, i.e. how the composer's "discovery" of this new world came about.

Josef Škvorecký's (1924-2012) light-hearted and indeed boisterous novelisation of this part of the composer's life gives a very vivid impression of how it may have happened. Although the second part of the title seems to suggest it's probably imagined. I guess to find out which parts of this were true I will have to re-read the relevant 30 pages of Neil Wenborn's biography: Dvořák: His life and music, which didn't leave much of a lasting impression when I read them more than 10 years ago.

Škvorecký's version is a very elaborate choreography swirling around just about everybody who had anything to do with the composer's decision to move to New York, and then with the decision not to stay after the expiration of his first contract. The best parts go to the women around him, including his employer, the very remarkable Jeannette Thurber (1850-1946), his wife Anna, her older sister Josephine, and his daughter Otylia. Men come in as love interests for these formidable women, and also for comic relief, which often involves some very heavy drinking.

Many of the chapters are like crowded rooms where it is at times difficult to keep track of the many characters and their multiple interactions, with the narration typically jumping between times as they reminisce about earlier encounters with each other or with the great composer. With hindsight I should have drawn a flow chart for this. The author must have had one and I imagine it may have had a beautiful symmetry too complex for me to grasp while juggling all these connections in my mind while reading.

Leaving aside the gossipy bits involving a lot of heavy drinking and extramarital adventures, there is enough food for musical thought to justify reading the book as a source to learn about Dvořák's work of the American period. Musical and other soundscape influences of the New World that we now find immortalised in his works are pointed out and put into their biographical context (or quite possibly into an imagined context). Conversely, there is also some thoughts on how Dvorak's work in New York influenced the nascent American music scene, and how both sides of the deal might have co-evolved further, if Dvořák had decided to stay in New York. Which he might have done if his daughter, allegedly torn between two admirers, had opted for the one based in the US. So this musical question kind of justifies the reporting of young Otilya's New World adventures.

Apart from the works mentioned above, the American (inspired) output also includes a string quintet (with a second viola) and a suite (written for piano then arranged for orchestra), both of which I only discovered recently, and the opera Rusalka, which strangely didn't capture me when I listened to it once or twice. Will try again.