(++++) PURELY FOR POPULARITY

Dvořák: Slavonic Dances, Op. 46 and Op. 72 (complete). Czech Philharmonic conducted by Sir Simon Rattle. Pentatone. $17.99. 

     There is a longstanding tendency to attribute lofty motives to the creation of classical music, as if such mundane matters as financial wherewithal and audience-seeking are beneath the genre and its practitioners. This is a pleasant fantasy that flies in the face of the demonstrable realities of classical composition, including the many years in which composers were the hirelings of the aristocracy (hence all those Haydn baryton trios) and all those in which ever-more-extreme bids for audience attention were the norm (hence Liszt, Thalberg, Pixis, Czerny and the many other competing 19^th-century piano virtuosi). But it remains inescapably true that many composers, certainly the great ones, were able to transcend the quotidian need to earn a living and produce music that spoke to audiences, and continues to speak to them, in ways that go far beyond the circumstances of the works’ creation. If Wagner was motivated by a $5,000 fee to create his Grand Festival March and Beethoven by contemporary political realities to produce the cantata Der glorreiche Augenblick, the circumstances are certainly understandable and in no way detract from the impressiveness of so many of the composers’ other pieces. 

     And what, after all, is wrong with courting popular favor in addition to writing music for the ages – something that, in truth, very few composers thought they were doing? Certainly Dvořák’s Slavonic Dances have long since moved beyond the original reason for their creation to become staples of the concert hall and to inspire not only later folk-music-oriented composers but also practitioners of other art forms (radio, TV, movies and more). The fact that the dances were conceived for purely commercial purposes does nothing to diminish their beauty, elegance and staying power. After all, Brahms’ Hungarian Dances for piano four hands had proved, ever since the creation of the first set in 1869, to be highly profitable for Berlin publisher Nikolaus Simrock, and not only for Simrock’s eponymous publishing house: they became Brahms’ own most-profitable works. So Simrock’s desire for something similar from Brahms’ then-friend Dvořák, who actually ended up orchestrating some of the Brahms dances, was eminently sensible from a commercial standpoint. And sure enough, from the year 1878 – when Dvořák’s first Slavonic Dances were both composed and published – both Simrock and the composer found them very profitable indeed. 

     Dvořák was, however, quite as dedicated a composer as Brahms, and as his reputation spread – thanks in no small part to the Slavonic Dances – he started taking his already-serious music even more seriously. Thus, when Simrock asked Dvořák for a second set of dances, the composer produced music in 1886 that expanded the universe he had explored in the 1878 works. The result is that the Op. 72 dances are subtler and more complex than those from Op. 46, although no less warm and charming and no less sensitive to their region of origin. 

     Many of the best performances of the Slavonic Dances are the ones that seem most effortlessly idiomatic – those most steeped in the music and playing style of the geographical area from which the dances come. And certainly the Czech Philharmonic plays as if it has this music in its blood. That is evident even when the ensemble is led by a British conductor such as Sir Simon Rattle, who has the good sense to set appropriate tempos, ensure balance among the orchestra’s sections, and pretty much let the musicians lean into the music as is their wont. Or so it sounds – there is surely much more ongoing direction in this Pentatone release than is apparent, but the whole thing has a relaxed and almost informal atmosphere that is quite winning. What is certainly clear is that Rattle and the orchestra thoroughly understand both the elements that all the Slavonic Dances have in common and the ones in which the two sets – and, within the sets, specific dances – differ. As a result, for example, the Op. 72, No. 4 Dumka is a genuine highlight of the recording, filled with poetic expression and great lyricism as well as providing a strong contrast to the prior ebullient Skočná. Details of emphasis are well-managed throughout this recording, and it is a pleasure to hear the best-known dances – such as the Op. 46, No. 3 Polka – handled as attentively as slightly less-familiar ones. As a whole, this is an admirably played, well-balanced performance of music that continues to bring great pleasure to listeners even when used in media that did not exist in Dvořák’s time. The fact that the Slavonic Dances originated as money makers for a savvy music publisher is wholly irrelevant to the quality of the music and its ability, a century and a half after the dances were created, to continue to charm and delight audiences.