In 1892 Dvořák and his wife, Anna (on the far left in the photo) arrived in America. He’d come to take up the position of head of the National Conservatory of Music in New York; they stayed until 1895.
The Conservatory was, for the times, a very liberal institution, allowing both women(!) and African-American(!!) students to attend.
One such student, Harry Burleigh, an African-American, topped up his scholarship grant by doing odd-jobs around the building. He had a fine singing voice (listen below) and, unsurprisingly, while he worked, he sang, and, naturally, he sang spirituals.
Dvořák who, together with Smetana, was a leading figure in Czech national music, had come to the USA intending to discover/foster a distinctive American musical voice. So, on hearing Harry Burleigh singing plantation songs, he was fascinated by this original ‘American’ folk music, and got Burleigh to sing these work songs and spirituals for him.
Dvořák’s exposure to the other, and maybe more authentic(?), American music came about as a result of a holiday that he and his family (see them in the photo above) took in the expatriate Czech community of Spillville, Iowa.
Dvořák had intended to spend his 1893 holiday break back in Europe with his family, but his secretary, Josef Jan Kovařík (the rather nattily dressed young man at the back of the family photo) convinced him, instead, to spend his vacation in Kovařík’s home town of Spillville. The children were duly shipped across the Atlantic and the family set out for Iowa.
It was during this, by the composer’s own admission, idyllic holiday that Dvořák encountered the second influence in his pursuit of a genuine American musical voice. The Kickapoo Medicine Show, a travelling group of Iroquois Indians who encouraged people to buy their native medicines by singing and dancing, spent two weeks visiting Spillville. As with the spirituals, Dvořák was very taken with this non-European music and spent several evenings in the local pub encouraging the Iroquois to sing and dance for him.
Other than the famous New World Symphony, this holiday resulted in two chamber music pieces: the so-called American Quartet (No. 12 in F, Op. 96) and the Quintet in E-flat, Op. 97, also known as the American. Like the New World Symphony, both works clearly demonstrate the melodic influence of spirituals and the rhythmic vitality of the Iroquois drums (drums that are to be heard in the second movement (Allegro vivo) of the Quintet).
Allegro ma non troppo 00:00
Lento 09:24
Molto vivace 17:30
Finale: Vivace ma non troppo 21:21
Allegro non tanto: 0:08
Allegro vivo: 9:24
Larghetto Theme – Larghetto: 15:20
Variation I – Un poco più mosso: 17:22
Variation II – Poco più mosso: 18:56
Variation III – Un poco più mosso: 20:08
Variation IV – Poco meno mosso: 21:26
Variation V – Un poco più mosso: 22:43
Coda – Meno mosso: 23:44
Finale (Allegro giusto): 25:57
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Pantygwydr!
The Art of Listening 