Czech Philharmonic • Bryce Dessner

Josef Suk (1874–1935) composed Meditation on the Old Czech Chorale “St. Wenceslas”, Op. 35a shortly after the outbreak of the First World War. At that time, a general regulation came into force requiring every concert to begin with the Austrian national anthem as an expression of support for those fighting at the front. The regulation naturally also applied to the Bohemian Quartet (since 1918 known as the Czech Quartet), of which Suk was a member. The song “Gott erhalte Franz den Kaiser” [God Save Emperor Franz] was written by Joseph Haydn in 1797 on the occasion of the 29th birthday of Emperor Francis I of Austria [aka Francis II, the last Holy Roman Emperor]. It gained popularity over the years and in 1826 it became the official anthem of the Habsburg Monarchy. Haydn used its melody for variations in the free movement of his “Emperor” String Quartet, Op. 76, No. 3, and for some time the Bohemian Quartet circumvented the government regulation at concerts by including this movement. However, on the advice of his friend, Dr. Ferdinand Pečírka, Josef Suk counterbalanced the Austrian anthem by composing a piece using Czech symbolism. He availed himself of the ancient religious hymn “Saint Wenceslas” not in its historical form, but in the version that was popular and widely known at the time. Meditation premiered on 27 September 1914, at Prague’s Rudolfinum as part of the Bohemian Quartet’s first concert of the new season in aid of the national war treasury. Two months later, the orchestral version of the composition was performed by the Czech Philharmonic Orchestra conducted by Vilém Zemánek in Smetana Hall at the Municipal House. After the war, Suk wrote Legend of the Dead Victors for orchestra (Op. 35b) and the festive march Towards a New Life (Op. 35c), which together with Meditation on the Old Czech Chorale form a loose trilogy. The orchestral version of Meditation on the Old Czech Chorale was first performed on 30 October 1918 at the first concert of the Czech Philharmonic Orchestra conducted by Václav Talich in the newly established Republic of Czechoslovakia together with the premiere of Suk’s symphony Ripening and symphonic poem Praga.

Suk composed Legend of the Dead Victors, subtitled “Commemoration for Large Orchestra” between 1919 and 1920, dedicating it to fallen legionnaires. Described after its premiere as “a deeply human and compassionate work of majestic pathos and solemn tragedy,” it opens with percussion and brass, joined by strings in the tempo of a funeral march. After a trumpet fanfare, there comes a recapitulation of the first movement, culminating in a solemn tribute to the heroes. The composition was first performed on the eve of the anniversary of the founding of the Republic of Czechoslovakia on 27 October 1924 by the Czech Philharmonic Orchestra conducted by Václav Talich at a concert “in memory of the fallen heroes” together with Suk’s symphony Asrael.

The festive march Towards a New Life was based on an older sketch. In 1919, Suk submitted the work to a competition organized by the Sokol gymnastics organization under the pseudonym Josef Emanuel Skrýšovský (after the village of Skrýšov near his birthplace). Although the composition won first prize, some felt that the march was not sufficiently vigorous for its intended use. Suk subsequently composed an introductory fanfare and expanded the trio, but the work continued to struggle for acceptance. At the Seventh Sokol Rally in 1920, the march was performed in an arrangement by Prokop Oberthor for wind orchestra. Even the addition of a dramatic text by poet Petr Křička, utilizing motifs from the Blaník legend, Jan Hus, Comenius, and Masaryk, and an image of the country spanning from Šumava to the Tatra Mountains, over which a brave falcon flies, did not help very much. The march accompanied with text was first performed on 3 December 1931 by the Czech Philharmonic Orchestra and the Smetana Choir conducted by František Stupka in Smetana Hall. In 1932, the composition won a silver medal in an art competition at the Olympic Games in Los Angeles (no first prize was awarded), and after Suk’s death in 1935 the Czechoslovak Sokol community adopted it as its festive march. During the Second World War, its opening fanfare introduced programs by Jiří Voskovec and Jan Werich broadcast to their homeland by the BBC.

American composer and guitarist Bryce Dessner (*1976) is, together with his brother Aaron, a member of several ensembles. He composes film scores and collaborates with, among others, sisters Katia and Marielle Labèque, the Kronos Quartet, and many other musicians in various genres. In addition to a number of soundtracks, he has also composed a concerto for piano, a concerto for two pianos, a concerto for violin, and a concerto for cello. The suite St. Carolyn by the Sea is based on an episode in the novel Big Sur by the Beat Generation author Jack Kerouac (1922–1969). The novel was published in 1962 and has an autobiographical format. The author is hiding behind the fictional character of Jack Duluoz who describes his stays in Big Sur, California, where he is dealing with his alcoholism and mental breakdown. The novel concludes with an addendum, the poem “Sea: Sounds of the Pacific Ocean at Big Sur”, featuring a series of free associations of the sea peaceful and calming, stormy with surging waves, dangerous and deadly, the sea where the god Neptune resides, aquatic animals live, ships sail, and birds fly above. In his composition, Dessner translates the transformations of the sea into a soundscape. He admits that he wrote it in a state of emotional trauma. The composition starts with an almost romantic idyll, then it moves into an aggressive attack followed by calming down, and ends with the triumph of the sea.

Dessner’s sea music is thematically related to the Four Sea Interludes from the opera Peter Grimes by Benjamin Britten (1913–1976). The opera premiered on 7 June 1945 at Sadlers’s Wells Theatre in London. It is a story from a village on the east coast of England, in which Grimes, a fisherman suspected of murdering his apprentice, stands against the entire community; only Ellen Orford, a teacher, and Balstrode, a retired merchant sea captain, believe in Grimes’s innocence. Grimes is not a murderer, but when his hot temper causes the death of another boy, on Balstrode’s advice he dooms himself. “For most of my life, I have lived closely in touch with the sea,” Britten said. From his parents’ house in Lowestoft, the fishing port in Suffolk on the east coast of England, he had a direct view of the sea and watched its changes. The sea and the associated characters and relationships between people also play a role in Britten’s operas Billy Bud (1951) and Death in Venice (1973) after Thomas Mann’s novella of the same name. “In writing Peter Grimes, I wanted to express my awareness of the perpetual struggle of men and women whose livelihood depends on the sea.” The individual acts of the opera are linked by interludes, representing images of nature and describing the mental processes of its characters. The interludes cover the scene changes and tie the plot together, but they can stand on their own as autonomous orchestral compositions. Dawn follows the conversation between Grimes and Ellen in Act 1. The melody in the high registers is almost static, accompanied by chords that foreshadow the coming tragedy. Sunday Morning greets people with chiming of church bells and birdsong. Moonlight is marked by the unfortunate death of Grimes’s apprentice; the hesitant and instable harmony forms a tormenting image of the fisherman’s soul. Storm was already heard during a scene change in Act 1 and now returns, but Grimes will not return from the sea.

The symphonic poem Praga came into being in 1904 after the death of Antonín Dvořák, Suk’s teacher and father-in-law. The main theme of the composition is derived from the Hussite chant “Who Are God’s Warriors”, which contrasts with a love motif. The composition is structured on the principle of a sonata movement and it is intended for large symphony orchestra with a richly equipped brass section, bells, and organ. It was first performed in Pilsen in May 1905 by the Czech Philharmonic Orchestra conducted by Oskar Nedbal, and its Prague premiere took place on 25 March 1905 at the Rudolfinum under the direction of Suk himself. The work is dedicated to the “Royal City of Prague”.