Shostakovich - From Jewish Folk Poetry, Opus 79a

After the successful premiere of his First Symphony in 1926, Dmitri Shostakovich was the darling of the Communist Government in Russia. But with the rise in power of Stalin the political climate changed. In 1936 Shostakovich was no longer the pride of the Soviet government. This was the year of the beginning of the Great Purge of anyone that the paranoid Stalin considered a rival or a danger to his authority. This purge affected the leadership of the Red Army, members of government,  all areas of Soviet life including the arts. Shostakovich lost many friends and colleagues in the years 1936-1938 and he feared for his own life as well.

Shostakovich managed to weather the storm of 1936 and by the time of the outbreak of World War Two his reputation had improved considerably, so much so that Stalin used his music as propaganda in the Russian war effort. But Shostakovich was not one to stay out of trouble for long. In 1948 he was denounced again. He lost his position at the Conservatory along with a considerable part of his income and once again he expeected to be hauled off in the middle of the night, never to return. He wrote film scores and other works to try and rehabilitate his official image again, but by this time Shostakovich also was writing works that were not meant for performance. He wrote these works purely out of an inner need to do so.  One of these private works was the song cycle From Jewish Folk Poetry.

Antisemitism in Russia ran so deep that it was considered a tradition. Shostakovich was not raised in this tradition by his liberal-minded parents, and as a result he was sensitive to the plight of Jewish people all his life. This deepened late in 1944 as news about the Nazi death camps was being brought to light. Stalin was also carrying out a campaign against the Jews in Russia beginning in 1948, when they were removed from public life with many being executed.

Shostakovich took his text from a collection of Jewish Folk Poetry that was published in 1947. He set eight songs and after a private performance he wrote three additional songs to lyrics he thought would be more acceptable to the authorities. But by that time antisemitism was running rampant with the government and the song cycle didn't have its premiere until 1955 after Stalin's death. The original version of the song cycle is for soprano, mezzo-soprano and tenor with piano accompaniment. Shostakovich orchestrated the songs later for chamber orchestra and it is this version heard at the link.

1) Lament For A Dead Child
Sun and rain, shine and mist, the fog has descended,
the moon has grown dim.
Whom did she give birth to?
To a boy, to a boy.
And how did they name him?
Moyshele, Moyshele.
And in what did they rock Moyshele?
In a cradle.
And what did they feed him with?
With bread and onions.
And where did they bury him?
In a grave. Oy, little boy in the grave,
 in the grave, Moyshele in the grave.

Shostakovich was influenced not only by Jewish poetry but by Jewish klezmer  music. This influence can be heard in many of his compositions and especially in this song cycle.
2) The Thoughtful Mother And Aunt
Bye, bye, bye, to the village, Daddy go!
Bring us an apple, so our eyes won’t hurt! Bye…
Bye, bye, bye, to the village, Daddy, go!
Bring us a chicken, so our teeth won’t hurt! Bye…
Bye, bye, bye, to the village, Daddy, go!
Bring us a duck, so our chest won’t hurt! Bye…
Bye, bye, bye, to the village, Daddy, go!
Bring us a goose, so our stomach won’t hurt! Bye…
Bye, bye, bye, to the village, Daddy, go!
Bring us some seeds, so our crown won’t hurt! Bye…
Bye, bye, bye, to the village, Daddy, go!
Bring us a rabbit, so our fingers won't hurt! Bye…

3) Lullaby
My son who is the most beautiful in the world,
sleep, but I’m not sleeping.
Your father is in chains in Siberia,
The Tsar holds him in prison,
Sleep, lu-lu-lu, lu-lu.
Rocking your cradle, your mother sheds tears.
Later you will understand yourself what grieves her heart.
Your father is in far Siberia, and I suffer in misery.
Sleep while you’re still carefree, and lu-lu-lu, lu-lu-lu.
My grief is darker than the night, sleep, but I’m not sleeping.
Sleep, my beautiful, sleep, my son, sleep, lu-lu-lu, lu-lu-lu.

4) Before A Long Parting
Soprano: Oy, Abram, how will I live without you?
Me without you, you without me,
how will we live apart?

Tenor: Do you remember when we were under the porch,
what you told me in secret?
Oy, oy, Rivochka, let me kiss your lips, my darling!

Soprano: Oy, Abram, how will we live now?
Me without you, you without me,
oy, such a door without latch.

Tenor: Do you remember when we were walking hand in hand,
what you told me on the boulevard?
Oy, oy, Rivochka, let me kiss your lips, my darling!

Soprano: Oy, Abram, how will we live now?
Me without you, you without me,
How will we live without happiness?
Tenor: Oy, Rivochka, how will I live without you?
Me without you, you without me,
How will we live without happiness?

Soprano: Do you remember when I was wearing a red skirt?
Oy, as I was beautiful then! Oy, Abram ,! Oy, Abram!
Tenor: Oy, oy, Rivochka, let me kiss your lips, my darling!

5) A Warning
Listen, Khasya, You must not go out,
Do not adventure out,
Don’t date anyone,
Take care, take care!

If you go out, and if you
walk until morning, oy,
Then you will weep bitterly,
Khasya! Hear! Khasya!

6) The Abandoned Father
Mezzo-soprano: Heleh the old man put on his coat.
His daughter ran off with a policeman.

Tenor: Tsirélé, girl! Come back to your father,
I will give you a beautiful dress for your wedding.
Tsirélé, girl! I will buy you earrings and rings for your fingers.
Tsirélé, girl! And a fine young man,
a young man I will give you also.
Tsirélé, girl!

Mezzo-soprano: I do not need clothes, I do not need rings.
I will marry my policeman. Mr. Policeman Please, hurry, hurry up and drive
This old Jew away!
Tenor: Tsirélé, girl! Come back to me!
Tsirélé, girl! Come back to me!
Oy, come back to me, come back to me.
Tsirélé, girl!

7) The Song of Misery
The roof sleeps sweetly in the attic under the straw.
In the cradle sleeps a child without swaddling, all naked.

Hop, hop, higher, higher!
A goat eats straw from the roof!
Hop, hop, higher, higher!
A goat eats straw from the roof, oy!

The cradle is in the attic,
In it a spider weaves misfortune.
It sucks away my happiness,
Leaving me only misery.

Hop, hop, higher, higher!
A goat eats straw from the roof!
Hop, hop, higher, higher!
A goat eats straw from the roof, oy!

A rooster is in the attic,
With a bright red comb.
Oy, wife, borrow for the children
A piece of stale bread.

Hop, hop, higher, higher!
A goat eats straw from the roof!
Hop, hop, higher, higher!
A goat eats straw from the roof, oy!

8) Winter
My Sheyndl is lying on the bed,
with a sick child.
There is not a branch to warm the cottage,
and the wind howls around the walls.
Ah ... 

The cold and the wind have returned,
There is no strength to suffer in silence.
Cry and weep, my children,
winter has returned.
Ah ...

9) A Good Life
Of wide fields, dear friends,
I did not sing songs long ago.
Not for me did the fields bloom,
Not for me did dew-drops flow down.

In a narrow cellar, in humid darkness,
Lived I once, worn out by misery.
And a sad song ascended from the cellar,
Of grief, of my unparalleled suffering.

Kolkhoz river, flow joyfully,
Quickly give my regards to my friends.
Tell them that my home is now in the kolkhoz.
A blossoming tree stands under my window.

Now the fields bloom for me,
They feed me with milk and honey.
I’m happy, and you tell my brothers:
I’ll write songs to the kolkhoz fields.

10) The Young Girl's Song
In a meadow near the forest, from dawn to dusk,
we keep the kolkhoz herd.
And I'm sitting there on a hill, with my little flute,
and I can’t stop to watch enough the beauty of my country.
Trees covered in bright foliage stand so gracefully and so delicately,
in the fields wheat ripens full of goodness and delight.
Oy, oy, Lyou-Lyou!

Now a branch smiles at me, and then a wink,
and a feeling of great joy lights a spark in my heart.
Then sings my little flute! Together we sing quietly!
Mountains and valleys listen to our song full of joy.
But do not cry, my flute! Forget the sorrows of the past,
and let your tunes flow gracefully into the country.
Oy, oy, Lyou-Lyou!

The kolkhoz makes me happy, do you hear? My life is so full!
More cheerfully, more cheerfully, my flute, you must sing!

11) Happiness
I boldly took my husband’s arm,
So what if I’m old and my date is old, too!
I took him with me to the theatre,
And we bought two tickets to the pit.

Sitting there with my husband late into the night,
Everyone succumbed to the happy thoughts
About what wealth surrounds
The Jewish shoemaker’s wife.

Oy, oy, oy, oy, what wealth surrounds
The Jewish shoemaker’s wife. Oy!

And to the whole country will I tell
About my happy and bright lot!
Doctors, doctors, have become our sons – 
A star shines above our heads!

Oy, oy, oy, oy, a star shines,
A star shines,
A star shines above our heads!
Doctors, doctors,
Have become our sons! A star shines
Above our heads. Oy!

Liszt - Two Lieder: Die Lorelei, S. 273 - O lieb, so lang du lieben kannst, S. 298

Franz Liszt as composer is most often thought of a writer of music for the piano and for his thirteen Symphonic Poems, but he also wrote 87 songs.  Although he was Hungarian by birth, he was closely aligned with the German music aesthetic and about 53 of his songs were set to German lyrics.  Liszt's music faded in importance after his death and outside of a handful of works, it was performed little. There is a renewed interest in his music, but his songs are still rarely performed.

The Lorelei

The first song is a setting of the poem Die Lorelei by Heinrich Heine. Heine based his poem on the ancient legend associated with The Lorelei, a large rock formation on the Rhine River. The name comes from old German words that meanmurmuring rock, given to the rock because of the noises given off by a small waterfall and current of the river that can be heard as murmuring echos off the rock face. The name Lorelei is also given to a female water spirit that legend says sits on the top of the rock and murmurs as it combs its hair, and while doing so distracts sailors from guiding their boats around the narrow channel of the river and causes their vessels to destruct on the rocks.

Liszt wrote two versions of the song, the first in 1841. He revised the song in 1854 and it is this second version that is heard at the link below.

Die Lorelei
I can't explain what it means
This haunting pain:
A tale of bygone ages
Keeps running through my brain.

The air cools in the twilight,

Heinrich Heine

And peaceful flows the Rhine,
The rocky summits reflect
The sunset's waning light.

The loveliest maiden is sitting
High-throned on the rock.
Her golden jewels are shining,
She combs her golden hair;

She combs with a comb that is golden,
And sings a strange refrain
That causes a deadly enchantment
In the listener's ear.

The sailor in his drifting sailboat,
Is entranced by sad sweet tones,
He doesn't see the breakers,
He sees the maid alone.

The wind and water engulf him!
So perish sailor and ship;
And this, with her baleful singing,
Is the Lorelei's gruesome work.



The next song is a work that is more often heard in a transcription for solo piano that Liszt had published under the title of Liebesträume No. 3.  The song was set to a poem by German poet Ferdinand Freiligrath in 1845.

O love, love as long as you can!
O love, love as long as you will!

Ferdinand Freiligrath

The time will come, the time will come,
When you will stand mourning at the grave.

And let it be that your heart glows
And nurtures and carries love,
As long as another heart is still
Warmly struck by love for you!

And to one who gives his heart to you,
O to him, do what you can, in Love!
And make him happy every hour
And never let him be gloomy for an hour.

And guard your tongue tightly,
So no angry word spills out,
O God, even if no harm was meant,
The other may recoil, hurt and sighing.

Mozart - Concert Aria For Soprano "Vorrei spiegarvi, oh Dio!" K.418

The world of 18th century opera was a markedly different environment in many ways than the modern day opera house. With no copyright protection for composers, many of them supervised the first productions of their operas to earn some money off of their music before it was pirated by other opera companies and publishers. But the best singers back then, like the best singers now, were the stars of the show. Most opera composers wrote music with specific singers in mind, and the singers themselves would take many liberties with the music for the sake of displaying particular vocal strong points, so much that the original music could get lost in a sea of added ornamentation, runs and long held notes.

Composers could be part of this cavalier attitude towards opera as well. A custom of the time was for composers to write arias for specific singers that were called insertion arias because they would be inserted in place of an original aria written by the opera's composer. In Mozart's time the use of insertion arias had been going on for so long that they had become a tradition, and many of Mozart's concert arias were originally written as insertion arias.  Vorrei spiegarvi, oh Dio! (Let me explain, oh God!) K.418 is just such an insertion aria. Mozart wrote it for his sister-in-law Aloysia Weber, a soprano that had a successful career on the Vienna opera stage. At one time Mozart had wanted to marry Aloysia, but he ended up marrying her sister Constanze instead.  Mozart wrote other insertion arias for Aloysia and she performed roles in some of his operas as well. She must have been a fine singer because the arias Mozart wrote for her are quite demanding.

Vorrei spiegarvi, oh Dio! was written to be inserted in an opera titled  Il curioso indiscreto (The Curious, Indiscreet Man) by the composer Pasquale Anfossi. The libretto was based on the book Don Quixote. The aria begins in a slow tempo with muted strings and a beautiful part for oboe that continues in duet with the soprano who sings the part of Clorinda, who is in love with a Count, who is promised in marriage to another woman named Emilia. Clorinda sings that she wishes she could explain to him why she appears not to return his love. The tempo quickens in the second part of the aria as she urges him to leave her, telling him to go to Emilia.  Mozart puts the soprano through her paces as he uses notes that span over two octaves in this effective and impressive aria.

Let me explain, oh God,
What my grief is!
But fate has condemned me
To weep and stay silent.

My heart may not pine
For the one I would like to love
Making me seem hard-hearted
And cruel.

 Ah, Count, part from me,
Run, flee
Far away from me;
Your beloved Emilia awaits you
 Don't let her languish,
She is worthy of love.

Ah, pitiless stars!
You are hostile to me.
I am lost when he stays.
Part from me, run,
Speak not of love,
Her heart is yours. 

Mozart

Rubinstein - Persian Love Songs, Opus 35, No. 9 'Swirling Waves'

As a reaction to the Age of Enlightenment, artists of the late 18th century began to create works that were reflections of their ideals of free expression. This was the beginning of the Romantic movement, a movement that was guided by numerous influences, with the emphasis on emotion.  The emotion most often represented was love, which sometimes took the form of unrequited love that ended in the violent end of one or both the parties involved.

Mizra Shafi Vazeh

Another influence on the Romantics was the exoticism of different lands and peoples. These were often expressed as crude stereotypes such as the Janissary music imitated by Mozart in the third movement of his Piano Sonata In A Major K.331.  But exoticism also exerted an influence through artists that were natives of those far away places. One of those artists was a poet from Azerbaijan, Mirza Shafi Vazeh, who continued the tradition of Azerbaijani classic poetry. He was also fluent in the Persian language and some of those poems were collected by one of his devoted German disciples Friedrich Martin von Bodenstedt.  Mirza Shafi Vazeh was literate but seldom wrote down his poems. Bodenstedt wrote some of them down in the original Persian, translated them to German and in 1851 published them in a book titled Die Lieder des Mirza Schaffy.  Anton Rubinstein chose twelve poems from this book to set to music for his opus 34 12 Lieder des Mirza-Schaffy, also known as Persian Love Songs. 

Friedrich von Bodenstedt

Rubinstein was second only to Liszt in his ability to play the piano. His repertoire was vast, his stamina legendary, he also became a conductor and founded the St. Petersburg Conservatory. But he also had ambitions as a composer and wrote a huge amount of music in all the forms of the day.  His 4th Piano concerto was once a staple of the repertoire, but despite a modern resurgence of interest, his music is rarely heard. Persian Love Songs has been recorded a few times and although the text Rubinstein set was in German, they are usually sung in Russian translation.  The 9th song in the set, 'Swirling Waves', was a favorite of the Russian opera singer Feodor Chaliapin, whose interpretation of the song has become somewhat of a tradition.  The video below has a recording sung by Boris Shtokolov, one of the most famous Russian bass singers of the modern era. His interpretation adds some of the falsetto singing introduced in the song by Chaliapin that deviates from Rubinstein's original music:

At my feet the swirling waves of the Kura River,

In the dancing bustle of the waves,

The sun smiles brightly, as do my heart and the meadow,

Oh, that it would ever remain thus!

The red Kakhetian wine sparkles in the glass,

That is filled by my beloved,

And with the wine I draw in her glances as well,

Oh,that it would ever remain thus!

The sun is sinking, already night is darkening,

But my heart, like the star of love,

Flames in the deepest darkness, in brightest splendor.

Oh, that it would ever remain thus!

Into the black sea of your eyes rushes

The raging river of my love;

Come, maiden, it is getting dark and no one can hear us!

Oh, that it would ever remain thus!

Schubert - Gretchen am Spinnrade

Johann Goethe was a writer that inspired the entire 19th century world of art, specifically the Germanic-speaking world.  Franz Schubert fell under the spell of Goethe's works early on, and the first lied he set to Goethe's text was Gretchen am Spinnrade (Gretchen At The Spinning Wheel), the text of which was taken from a scene in Faust. The year was 1814 and Schubert was 17 years old. Goethe remained an inspiration to Schubert for the rest of his short life as he wrote over 80 lieder to texts of Goethe, including his famous setting of Der Erlkönig. 

The scene depicts Gretchen at her spinning wheel as her mind drifts to Faust, a man she has recently met and fallen deeply in love with.  Schubert uses the piano as an illustrative device as the music depicts the wheel spinning in the right hand notes, the clicking of the spool that gathers the yarn in the staccato eighth-note accompaniment in the left hand and the pedal that makes the wheel spin in the lower notes in the left hand:

The passion of Gretchen grows until it reaches near madness in the 7th stanza, when the piano depicts the halting of the spinning wheel as she is overcome with the thought of his kiss. The wheel makes a few false starts before it begins again. The passion grows once again, until the first stanza is repeated and the wheel stops.  The song begins and ends in D minor, but Schubert takes the harmony far afield, a characteristic of Schubert's music that was to continue.  This song of 1814 led to one of Schubert's most productive years when in 1815 he wrote over 100 lieder as well as many works for orchestra and chorus.

There were many composers that wrote works of musical imagery before Schubert. The cantatas of Bach as well as the oratorios of Handel are but two examples of works that contained illustrative music, but Gretchen am Spinnrade was a turning point in the history of the German lied.  Schubert's fertile imagination and his pairing of the voice and piano as equal partners in musical expression influenced countless song composers.

Gretchen At The Spinning Wheel
My peace is gone,
My heart is heavy,
I will find it never
and never again.

Where I do not have him,
That is the grave,
The whole world
Is bitter to me.

My poor head
Is crazy to me,
My poor mind
Is torn apart.

My peace is gone,
My heart is heavy,

I will find it never
and never again.

I look only for him
Out the window
Only for him do I go
Out of the house.

His tall walk,
His noble figure,
His mouth's smile,
His powerful eyes,


His mouth's
Magic flow,
His touch,
and ah! his kiss!

My peace is gone,
My heart is heavy,
I will find it never
and never again.

My bosom urges itself
toward him.
Ah, might I grasp
And hold him!

And kiss him,
As I want,
With his kisses
I should die!

Debussy - Preludes For Piano Book One

Claude Debussy has been identified with Impressionism, exemplified by the paintings of Renoir and Monet among others. Debussy himself disliked the term and rejected any association with it. As he said himself:

I am trying to do 'something different'...what the imbeciles call 'impressionism', a term which is as poorly used as possible, particularly by the critics. 

Some have suggested he was a proponent of Symbolism more than Impressionism, but  'isms' are but created labels that attempt to categorize. Not that these labels aren't useful. They certainly can give a sense of structure for study and understanding. But labels are models to aid in understanding. As soon as a model is used as a definite mold to force art to  conform to specific rules, the model loses its value.

Debussy's talent was such that he was admitted to the Paris Conservatoire when he was ten years old. During his 11 years there he constantly challenged his teachers and the directorship of Ambroise Thomas, a musical conservative.  He earned the praise and admiration of his teachers and fellow students for his abilities as a pianist and sight-reader, but his compositions were not understood. He understood the models of music that were taught in his classes, but he refused to allow his creativity to be controlled by them.

That is not to say that he was not influenced by other composers. Richard Wagner was a profound influence, as well as Mussorgsky. Older music also had an influence, such as the Baroque clavicenists such as Couperin as well as J.S. Bach. Each one of these influences were digested and internalized by Debussy's talent and transformed into his own highly original music. American Ragtime, the Gamelan from Java all played a part as well as literature and the visual arts.

Debussy was a slow and meticulous composer, but uncharacteristically the Preludes Book One was begun in late 1909 and finished three months later.  He kept with the traditional number of preludes of 24 (in two books of 12) as set by many composers before him, especially J.S. Bach and Chopin. But where Bach had his preludes (and the fugues that went with them) follow each other in a half-step progression of keys and Chopin followed the circle of fifths, Debussy's preludes follow no set key sequence, although groups of them seem to be tonally related.  Debussy doesn't use conventional keys hardly at all as he uses church modes, pentatonic scales and the whole tone scale in writing them.

Another unique feature of Debussy's preludes is that while each one is titled, the title appears at the end of the piece instead of the beginning.

1)  Danseuses de Delphes (Dancers of Delphi) -  Debussy begins with music inspired by ancient Greek dancers in music that gently moves through different types of scales and melodies.  This first prelude gives a clue to what will proceed, and renders what Debussy himself said is his musical objective:

Wagner pronounced himself in favor of the laws of harmony. I am for freedom. But freedom must essentially be free. All the noises we hear around ourselves can be re-created. Every sound perceived by the acute ear in the rhythm of the world about us can be represented musically. Some people wish to conform to the rules; for myself, I wish only to render what I can hear.

2)  Voiles (Veils or Sails) - The title of this prelude is ambiguous, quite appropriate for the music. Either the sails of ships billowing in a breeze, or the sensuous form of a woman only partially hidden by diaphanous veils. The whole tone scale is used throughout with the chromatic scale added for variety.

3)  Le vent dans la plaine (The wind in the plain) -  A depiction of strong as well as gentle breezes. There is no documentation as to whether Debussy intended the preludes to be played as an entire set. Shortly after their composition, Debussy himself as well as other pianists played them in groups of three.  The first three preludes sound well together played this way.

4)  Les sons et les parfums tournent dans l'air du soir (The sounds and fragrances swirl through the evening air) - The title is inspired by a poem by Charles Beaudelaire titled Harmonie Soir (Evening Harmony).  This preludes ends with a short coda that is marked by the composer 'as a far away horn call'.

5)  Les collines d'Anacapri (The hills of Anacapri) - Anacapri is a small village on the Isle of Capri in the Gulf of Naples off the Italian coast. Debussy begins the prelude slowly until it erupts in an Italian dance, the tarantella. The dance is interrupted by a folk song like melody in the middle section. The dance returns and leads to a glittering ending in the extreme treble of the keyboard which is marked lumineux (luminous).

6)  Des pas sur la neige (Footsteps in the snow) - A bleak landscape of snow and cold is represented as a persistent motive is repeated.  Debussy gives the direction that 'the tempo must be such that it sounds like a sad, icy landscape'.  There is little relief from the cold atmosphere in this prelude that is a challenge for the pianist to bring off with Debussy's intended effect.

7)  Ce qu'a vu le vent d'Ouest (What the west wind has seen) -  The subtle colors of the preceeding preludes are swept away by this depiction of a violent wind that roars off the coast of France during a storm at sea.

8)  La fille aux cheveux de lin (The girl with the flaxen hair) - One of the most often played preludes, this gentle music is in stark contrast to the preceding violent one. Gentle chords surround Debussy's original melody that sounds like a folk song.

9)  La sérénade interrompue (The interrupted serenade) - Debussy continues the French love of Spanish music in this prelude that depicts a Spanish guitarist that tries to serenade his sweetheart. Is the father the one that slams the window to shut out the serenade, or the beloved? No matter, the serenader finally gives up and wanders off.

10) La Cathédrale engloutie (The engulfed cathedral) - Another of the most popular preludes, this is a representation of the legend of the cathedral of the ancient city of Ys in Brittany that sank to the bottom of the ocean when the city was swallowed by the sea. Once every hundred years the cathedral rises out of the ocean to the tolling of its bells and the chanting of monks. It then sinks back into the sea.  With thunderous chords in the middle section, Debussy has the piano do a credible impression of pipe organ sonority. Widely-spaced chords (including six-note chords to be played by the five fingers of the right hand) add to the mysterious nature of the legend before the cathedral slips back under the water.

11) La danse de Puck (Puck's dance) - A representation of the mischievous Puck from Shakespeare's A Midsummer Night's Dream.

12) Minstrels - Traveling minstrel shows appeared in Europe around the turn of the 20th century and were very popular. European composers were influenced by ragtime and early jazz music. Debussy's creative imagination attracted him to different kinds of music and art, and led to this witty representation of the banjo and minstrel music.

Dvořák - Cigánské Melodie (Gypsy Songs) Op. 55

Antonín Dvořák's music didn't become known outside of his native Bohemia until he entered and won the Austrian State Prize contest in 1877, a competition that awarded a stipend to the winner.  Dvořák not only benefited from the prize money (which went far in helping to alleviate his condition of near poverty) but members of the panel of judges of the competition helped make his works known world-wide. One of those members was Johannes Brahms who recommended Dvořák's compositions to his publisher Simrock. With a music publisher's eye for sales, Simrock commissioned Dvořák to compose a set of dances similar to Brahms' Hungarian Dances. Dvořák filled the commission with the successful Slavonic Dances in 1878, which were played across Europe and the United States.

Hot on the heels of this great success and his new international reputation Dvořák wrote Cigánské Melodie (Gypsy Songs), a set of seven songs set to the poetry of Czech poet Adolph Heyduk. The songs were written in 1880 for  Gustav Walter, the popular tenor of the Vienna State Opera. Heyduk wrote a translation of the poems in German for Dvořák in deference to Walter, and a version of the songs using the original Czech language was made later.

Adolph Heyduk

There was something of a fad for gypsy music for much of the 19th century, although what was called gypsy music at the time was more of an idealized mixture of European folk music with a few exotic gypsy motifs thrown in.  Dvořák's Gypsy Songs owe more to Czech and Slovak folk songs than authentic gypsy music as well. But the freedom of gypsy life is in the songs and serves as a representation of the struggles for freedom of the Czech people from the repressive Austrian government of the time.

I want to thank Anna Matjas Royko and Gayle Royko Heuser for extending permission to include their translation of the Czech texts:

1) Ma pisen zas mi laskou zni  (My song resounds with love) 
The piano opens with measured tremolos in thirds in the right hand that lead to rolled chords that accompany the vocalist. A middle section in major mode provides contrast before the piano repeats the opening and ends in the home key of G minor -
 My song resounds with love when the old day is dying;

it is sowing its shadows and reaping a collection of pearls.

My song resonates with longing while my feet roam distant lands.

My homeland is in the distant wilderness—my song stirs with nationalism.

My song reverberates with love, while unplanned storms hasten.

I rejoice in the freedom that I no longer have a part in the dying of a brother.
translation © Anna Majtas Royko and Gayle Royko Heuser

2) Aj! Kterak trojhranec (Ah! My three-cornered bell)

The three-cornered bell is actually a triangle -
Ah! Why is my three-cornered bell ringing so passionately?

As a gypsy song -- when death is imminent -- the death of a gypsy

brings an end to song, dance, love and all concerns!

translation © Anna Majtas Royko and Gayle Royko Heuser

3)  A les je tich kolem kol (The forest is quiet all around)

A simple accompaniment gently plays as the singer unwinds a beautiful melody -
The forest is quiet all around; only the heart disturbs the peace.

As black smoke gushing, tears flow down my cheeks and so they dry.

They need not dry—let other cheeks feel them!

The one who can sing in sorrow will not die, but lives and lives on.

 translation © Anna Majtas Royko and Gayle Royko Heuser

4)  Kdyz mne stara matka (Songs my mother taught me)

The most well-known song in the set, this song is played regularly in vocal recitals and the melody has been arranged for many different solo instruments.  A distinctive feature of this song is the time signature of 2/4 for the soloist while the piano is written in 6/8 -
When my old mother taught me to sing,

Strange that she often had tears in her eyes.

And now I also weep, when I teach Gypsy children to play and sing.

 translation © Anna Majtas Royko and Gayle Royko Heuser

5)  Struna naladena (The string is taut!)

The string is taut—young man turn, spin, twirl!

Today reach the heights, tomorrow down again and

after tomorrow, at the Holy Table of the Nile.

The taut string is stretched—turn young man—turn and twirl!

 translation © Anna Majtas Royko and Gayle Royko Heuser

6)  Siroke rukavy (Wide sleeves)

Wide sleeves and broad trousers give more freedom than a robe of gold.

The robe of gold constricts the chest and the song within the body dies.

He who is happy -- his song blooms with the desire that the

whole world would lose its taste for gold.

 translation © Anna Majtas Royko and Gayle Royko Heuser

7)  Dejte klec jest`rábu ze zlata (Given a cage of gold)

Given a cage to live in, made of pure gold,

the Gypsy would exchange it for the freedom of a nest of thorns.

Just as a wild horse rushes to the wasteland, seldom bridled or reined in,

so too the Romani nature has been given eternal freedom!
 translation © Anna Majtas Royko and Gayle Royko Heuser