Jack Fear

Cat crawling through the hole?

The most famous and most important Czech music festival Prague spring starts today. Its 65th year is traditionally initiated by six of symphonic poems known as My Country (more literally My Fatherland) composed by the composer Bedřich Smetana, this time the implementation of the Prague Philharmonia conducted by Jakub Hrůša.

You probably also noticed the posters and television trailers containing "set to music" posters, of course in the Czech streets and TV stations. One of them shows the tune of probably the most famous composition of entire My Country, Vltava (or The Moldau). Does the poster provoke you humming the tune, reminding you something or are you right on belief that it is exactly that folk? Right on this one of the main melody is said to be taken from Czech folk songs Cat crawling through the hole transposed into a minor key. But don't say this to the Swedes. They are proud that Smetana based the melody on their folk song. Smetana lived in Sweden in the fifties of the 19th century. However one Czech scientist tracked down even to forty tunes which could form the basis of Vltava. On the opposite site is the claim that Samuel Cohen wrote the Israeli national anthem probably on the basis of this Smetana's poem.

Smetana alone said on Vltava: “The composition describes the course of the Vltava, starting from the two small sprint, the Cold and Warm Vltava, to the unification of both stress into a single current, the course of the Vltava through woods and meadows, through landscapes where a farmer’s wedding is celebrated, the round dance of the mermaids in the night’s moonshine; on nearby rocks loom proud castles, palaces and ruins aloft. The Vltava swirls into the St. John’s Rapids; then it widens and flow toward Prague, past the Vyšehrad, and then majestically vanishes into the distance, ending at the Labe.“

While listening to the entire cycle, Smetana's passion of his homeland is evident. From the heart described beauty of Czech land and its legends and myths. Just listen again and deliberately what you recall?