Legends (Dvořák)
''Legends'', Op. 59, B. 117 ( cs, Legendy), is a forty-minute group of ten pieces by the Czech composer Antonín Dvořák. They were written in early 1881 for piano duet and reset later that year for a reduced orchestra (B. 122). Background On 15 October 1880, the day before finishing the score of his sixth symphony, Dvořák wrote to his publisher Fritz Simrock about his plans for the near future saying he hoped to finish a piano duet cycle, "Legends," in the next month.Score, p. V He did not, however, begin to sketch the work until 30 January 1881. The definitive shape of the piano version was created from 12 February to 23 March 1881, partly in Prague and partly in Vysoká u Příbrami. Dvořák dedicated the composition to the critic Eduard Hanslick, who praised the cycle with great enthusiasm. The piano duet version was printed by the German publishing house Simrock in mid-1881. In that same year Dvořák arranged the cycle for orchestra. The orchestration ... [...More Info...]       [...Related Items...]     OR:     [Wikipedia]   [Google]   [Baidu]   |
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Czech People
The Czechs ( cs, Češi, ; singular Czech, masculine: ''Čech'' , singular feminine: ''Češka'' ), or the Czech people (), are a West Slavic ethnic group and a nation native to the Czech Republic in Central Europe, who share a common ancestry, culture, history, and the Czech language. Ethnic Czechs were called Bohemians in English until the early 20th century, referring to the former name of their country, Bohemia, which in turn was adapted from the late Iron Age tribe of Celtic Boii. During the Migration Period, West Slavic tribes settled in the area, "assimilated the remaining Celtic and Germanic populations", and formed a principality in the 9th century, which was initially part of Great Moravia, in form of Duchy of Bohemia and later Kingdom of Bohemia, the predecessors of the modern republic. The Czech diaspora is found in notable numbers in the United States, Canada, Israel, Austria, Germany, Slovakia, Ukraine, Switzerland, Italy, the United Kingdom, Australia, France, Rus ... [...More Info...]       [...Related Items...]     OR:     [Wikipedia]   [Google]   [Baidu]   |
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Antonín Dvořák
Antonín Leopold Dvořák ( ; ; 8 September 1841 – 1 May 1904) was a Czechs, Czech composer. Dvořák frequently employed rhythms and other aspects of the folk music of Moravian traditional music, Moravia and his native Bohemia, following the Romantic-era Czech nationalism, nationalist example of his predecessor Bedřich Smetana. Dvořák's style has been described as "the fullest recreation of a national idiom with that of the symphonic tradition, absorbing folk influences and finding effective ways of using them". Dvořák displayed his musical gifts at an early age, being an apt violin student from age six. The first public performances of his works were in Prague in 1872 and, with special success, in 1873, when he was 31 years old. Seeking recognition beyond the Prague area, he submitted a score of his Symphony No. 1 (Dvořák), First Symphony to a prize competition in Germany, but did not win, and the unreturned manuscript was lost until it was rediscovered many decades ... [...More Info...]       [...Related Items...]     OR:     [Wikipedia]   [Google]   [Baidu]   |
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Piano Duet
According to the ''Grove Dictionary of Music and Musicians'', there are two kinds of piano duet: "those for two players at one instrument, and those in which each of the two pianists has an instrument to themself." In American usage the former is often referred to as "piano four hands". Grove notes that the one-piano duet has the larger repertory, but has come to be regarded as a modest, domestic form of music-making by comparison with "the more glamorous two-piano duet".Dawes, Frank"Piano duet" ''Grove Music Online'', Oxford Music Online, accessed 31 March 2012 The latter is more often referred to as a piano duo.Bellingham, Jane"piano duet" ''The Oxford Companion to Music'', Ed. Alison Latham, Oxford Music Online, accessed 31 March 2012 The piano duet came to popularity in the second half of the 18th century. Mozart played duets as a child with his sister, and later wrote sonatas for four hands at one piano; Schubert was another composer who composed for the genre, notably with ... [...More Info...]       [...Related Items...]     OR:     [Wikipedia]   [Google]   [Baidu]   |
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Orchestra
An orchestra (; ) is a large instrumental ensemble typical of classical music, which combines instruments from different families. There are typically four main sections of instruments: * bowed string instruments, such as the violin, viola, cello, and double bass * woodwinds, such as the flute, oboe, clarinet, saxophone, and bassoon * Brass instruments, such as the horn, trumpet, trombone, cornet, and tuba * percussion instruments, such as the timpani, snare drum, bass drum, cymbals, triangle, tambourine, and mallet percussion instruments Other instruments such as the piano, harpsichord, and celesta may sometimes appear in a fifth keyboard section or may stand alone as soloist instruments, as may the concert harp and, for performances of some modern compositions, electronic instruments and guitars. A full-size Western orchestra may sometimes be called a or philharmonic orchestra (from Greek ''phil-'', "loving", and "harmony"). The actual number of musicians employ ... [...More Info...]       [...Related Items...]     OR:     [Wikipedia]   [Google]   [Baidu]   |
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Symphony No
A symphony is an extended musical composition in Western classical music, most often for orchestra. Although the term has had many meanings from its origins in the ancient Greek era, by the late 18th century the word had taken on the meaning common today: a work usually consisting of multiple distinct sections or movements, often four, with the first movement in sonata form. Symphonies are almost always scored for an orchestra consisting of a string section (violin, viola, cello, and double bass), brass, woodwind, and percussion instruments which altogether number about 30 to 100 musicians. Symphonies are notated in a musical score, which contains all the instrument parts. Orchestral musicians play from parts which contain just the notated music for their own instrument. Some symphonies also contain vocal parts (e.g., Beethoven's Ninth Symphony). Etymology and origins The word ''symphony'' is derived from the Greek word (), meaning "agreement or concord of sound", "concert of ... [...More Info...]       [...Related Items...]     OR:     [Wikipedia]   [Google]   [Baidu]   |
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Fritz Simrock
Friedrich August Simrock, better known as Fritz Simrock (January 2, 1837 in Bonn – August 20, 1901 in Ouchy) was a German music publisher who inherited a publishing firm from his grandfather Nikolaus Simrock. Simrock is most noted for publishing most of the music of Johannes Brahms and Antonín Dvořák. Simrock published almost all of Brahms's pieces from Opus 16 to Opus 120Sadie, Stanley; Tyrell, John eds. (2001). ''The New Grove Dictionary of Music and Musicians'' (2nd edition). New York: Oxford University Press. and was very good friends with Brahms, even going on holidays to Italy with him. Simrock generally paid Brahms well for his music, but with Dvořák he was often unwilling to publish orchestral pieces, for example, his Eighth Symphony. Simrock was so involved in the lives of prominent musicians that Joseph Joachim came to believe that his wife Amalie was cheating on him with Simrock, and Brahms wrote a famous "lengthy letter" in support of Amalie's innocence, whic ... [...More Info...]       [...Related Items...]     OR:     [Wikipedia]   [Google]   [Baidu]   |
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Prague
Prague ( ; cs, Praha ; german: Prag, ; la, Praga) is the capital and largest city in the Czech Republic, and the historical capital of Bohemia. On the Vltava river, Prague is home to about 1.3 million people. The city has a temperate oceanic climate, with relatively warm summers and chilly winters. Prague is a political, cultural, and economic hub of central Europe, with a rich history and Romanesque, Gothic, Renaissance and Baroque architectures. It was the capital of the Kingdom of Bohemia and residence of several Holy Roman Emperors, most notably Charles IV (r. 1346–1378). It was an important city to the Habsburg monarchy and Austro-Hungarian Empire. The city played major roles in the Bohemian and the Protestant Reformations, the Thirty Years' War and in 20th-century history as the capital of Czechoslovakia between the World Wars and the post-war Communist era. Prague is home to a number of well-known cultural attractions, many of which survived the ... [...More Info...]       [...Related Items...]     OR:     [Wikipedia]   [Google]   [Baidu]   |
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Vysoká U Příbrami
Vysoká (), a feminine form of an adjective meaning ''high'', ''tall'' in both Czech and Slovak languages is a common placename: Czech Republic * Vysoká (Bruntál District), a municipality and village in the Moravian-Silesian Region * Vysoká (Havlíčkův Brod District), a municipality and village in the Vysočina Region * Vysoká (Hostýn-Vsetín Mountains), a peak in the Hostýn-Vsetín Mountains * Vysoká (Mělník District), a municipality and village in the Central Bohemian Region * Vysoká (Svitavy District), a municipality and village in the Pardubice Region * Vysoká Lhota, a municipality and village in the Vysočina Region * Vysoká Libyně, a municipality and village in the Plzeň Region * Vysoká nad Labem, a municipality and village in the Hradec Králové Region * Vysoká Pec (Chomutov District), a municipality and village in the Ústí nad Labem Region * Vysoká Pec (Karlovy Vary District), a municipality and village in the Karlovy Vary Region * Vysoká Srbská, a ... [...More Info...]       [...Related Items...]     OR:     [Wikipedia]   [Google]   [Baidu]   |
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Eduard Hanslick
Eduard Hanslick (11 September 18256 August 1904) was an Austrian music critic, aesthetician and historian. Among the leading critics of his time, he was the chief music critic of the ''Neue Freie Presse'' from 1864 until the end of his life. He was a conservative critic and championed absolute music over programmatic music for much of his career. As such, he sided with and promoted the faction of Robert Schumann and Johannes Brahms in the so-called "War of the Romantics", often deriding the works of composers such as Franz Liszt and Richard Wagner. His best known work, the 1854 treatise ''Vom Musikalisch-Schönen'' (''On the Musically Beautiful''), was a landmark in the aesthetics of music and outlines much of his artistic and philosophical beliefs on music. Biography Hanslick was born in Prague (then in the Austrian Empire), the son of Joseph Adolph Hanslik, a bibliographer and music teacher from a German-speaking family, and one of Hanslik's piano pupils, the daughter of a J ... [...More Info...]       [...Related Items...]     OR:     [Wikipedia]   [Google]   [Baidu]   |
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Prague Conservatory
The Prague Conservatory or Prague Conservatoire ( cs, Pražská konzervatoř) is a music school in Prague, Czech Republic, founded in 1808. Currently, Prague Conservatory offers four or six year study courses, which can be compared to the level of high school diploma in other countries. Graduates of Prague Conservatory can continue their training by enrolling in an institution that offers undergraduate education. History The Prague Conservatory was founded in 1808 by local aristocrats and burghers following examples of Conservatoire de Paris (est. 1795) and Milan Conservatory (est. 1807). It belongs to the oldest modern existing Music school, music conservatories in the world. Classes started in 1811, after a delay caused by the Napoleonic Wars. Bedřich Diviš Weber was appointed the first director of the school. In 1891, Antonín Dvořák joined the faculty as the head of the composition department. He was the school's director between 1901 and 1904. Dvořák's students inc ... [...More Info...]       [...Related Items...]     OR:     [Wikipedia]   [Google]   [Baidu]   |
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Antonín Bennewitz
Antonín Bennewitz (also Anton Bennewitz; 26 March 1833 – 29 May 1926) was a Bohemian violinist, conductor and teacher. He was in a line of violinists that extended back to Giovanni Battista Viotti, and forward to Jan Kubelík and Wolfgang Schneiderhan (violinist), Wolfgang Schneiderhan. He was born in Přívrat, Bohemia as Antonín Benevic (his name is most often seen in a German rendering, Bennewitz) to a German father and a Czech mother. He studied under Moritz Mildner :ru:Мильднер, Мориц, (Мильднер, Мориц) (Mořic Mildner: 1812-1865) at the Prague Conservatory from 1846-52. He then worked in Prague (where he was engaged as first violinist of the Estates Theatre (1852-1861)), Salzburg and Stuttgart. In 1859 he performed in Paris and Brussels. It was during this period that on 3 December 1855 he participated in the first performance of Bedřich Smetana’s Piano Trio in G minor, Op. 15, in the Prague Konvict Hall, with Smetana himself as pianist and J ... [...More Info...]       [...Related Items...]     OR:     [Wikipedia]   [Google]   [Baidu]   |
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Vienna Philharmonic
The Vienna Philharmonic (VPO; german: Wiener Philharmoniker, links=no) is an orchestra that was founded in 1842 and is considered to be one of the finest in the world. The Vienna Philharmonic is based at the Musikverein in Vienna, Austria. Its members are selected from the orchestra of the Vienna State Opera. Selection involves a lengthy process, with each musician demonstrating their capability for a minimum of three years' performance for the opera and ballet. After this probationary period, the musician may request an application for a position in the orchestra from the Vienna Philharmonic's board. History Precursors and formation Until the 1830s, orchestral performance in Vienna was done by ''ad hoc'' orchestras, consisting of professional and (often) amateur musicians brought together for specific performances. In 1833, Franz Lachner formed the forerunner of the Vienna Philharmonic, the – an orchestra of professional musicians from the Vienna Court Opera (''Wiener Hof ... [...More Info...]       [...Related Items...]     OR:     [Wikipedia]   [Google]   [Baidu]   |