Cello Concerto

The Czech composer had agreed in 1892 to direct the National Conservatory of Music of America in New York. His three-year stay in America also produced two other iconic works: the “New World” Symphony No. 9 and the “American” String Quartet No. 12. While those pieces contain echoes of American musical idioms, the Cello Concerto is largely untouched by such influences. Instead, it draws upon the composer’s European roots, especially his beloved Bohemia, which he deeply missed. 

Dvořák was reportedly reluctant to write a cello concerto, viewing the cello primarily as an orchestral instrument and doubting its effectiveness as a soloist. However, after persistent encouragement from friends and especially after attending in New York the premiere of a cello concerto by Victor Herbert, his colleague at the Conservatory, he changed his mind. He completed the work in only three months. Back in Europe, the concerto underwent further revisions, thanks in part to suggestions from his friend, the celebrated cellist Hanuš Wihan. The concerto was premiered in London in March 1896 by Leo Stern, under the composer’s direction. Warmly received, it quickly became one of the most beloved concertos in the repertoire. 

Compared with his earlier piano and violin concertos, Dvořák’s cello concerto features a richer and more active orchestration, engaging in true dialogue with the soloist rather than merely providing accompaniment. He gives special prominence to the woodwinds (flutes, clarinets, oboes, and bassoons) whose combined presence, together with the horns, lends the concerto its distinctive woodland color. A heroic Allegro filled with striking contrasts is followed by an Adagio ma non troppo imbued with spiritual depth, in which the cello again converses intensely with the woodwinds. The concerto concludes with an energetic, rhapsodic Allegro moderato containing a quotation from one of Dvořák’s songs, “Leave Me Alone,” a discreet and touching homage to his recently deceased sister-in-law Josefína Kounicová, his youthful love.