During the Early May Bank Holiday (from 2 to 6 May 2024) we celebrated in style 50 years of our society with plenty of Czech chamber music. This celebration coincided with the Year of Czech Music and was part of the 2024 Leamington Summer Music Festival. Below are some impressions.

Leamington Festival – review of three concerts:  Amici della Musica [Thursday, 2 May], Martin Kasík (piano) [Friday, 3 May], Simon Wallfisch (baritone) & Iain Farrington (piano) [Sunday, 5 May]

The opening concert of the Festival by Amici della Musica – Philippe Graffin (violin), Elizabeth Wallfisch (viola), Raphael Wallfisch (cello) and Piers Lane (piano)  – performed a cross-section of Czech music with pieces by Dvořák and Smetana together with Mahler’s Piano Quartet movement in A minor and Erwin Schulhoff’s  Duo for Violin and Cello from 1925. The Mahler quartet, which was given a committed performance, may have come as a surprise to some listeners. A work of his teenage years, it was first performed in Vienna and Jihlava and then it disappeared until 1964. It is intense with densely worked themes. The Schulhoff Duo from 1925 was a delight to hear and witness. We rightfully, as it is his 200^th anniversary, then heard some early characteristic polkas and a Caprice bohemian, Op. 12 by Smetana. The concert concluded with a much more familiar piece – Dvořák’s Piano Quartet, Op. 87. A fitting piece with which to end, with its stream of melodies and characterful movements.  There was a slight hiatus to the opening of an inner movement with two false starts but it was greeted good-naturedly with smiles all round.  

Martin Kasík’s lunchtime recital brought us Bagatelles and Impromptus by Smetana, Dvořák’s Suite in A, Op. 98 and three popular pieces by Chopin – Ballade in G minor, Op. 23, Nocturne in D flat, Op. 27 No. 2 and the Scherzo in B flat minor, Op. 31. The Smetana and Dvořák compositions were played with understanding and sensitivity but it perhaps in the Chopin that Martin demonstrated his supreme mastery of touch and tone and dynamic contrast on the Fazioli instrument. This concert was a fitting tribute to Iain Smith and his wife Teresa Halikowska-Smith who had given much support to the Festival over the years. Sunday’s lunchtime vocal recital by Simon Wallfisch, sympathetically accompanied by Iain Farrington was a truly Czech potpourri. Songs by Mahler, Haas, Ullmann, Korngold and Dvořák interspersed with piano pieces by Suk (Longing from Spring, Op. 22a) and Janáček (Andante from In The Mists). It was intriguing to hear the four Mahler’s Songs of a Wayfarer inthis non-orchestral version. One was able to hear the detail of the piano figurations but perhaps compromised by the lack of the more familiar instrumental timbres. It was good to hear the representative songs inspired by Chinese poetry from two composers (Haas and Ullmann) incarcerated in Terezín and later put to death. With the song cycle of Gypsy Songs, Op. 55 by Dvořák we were once again on familiar territory with the ever-popular Songs my mother taught me being the fourth song of the cycle.  We learned afterwards that Simon was recovering from a throat infection and this was his first full recital which undoubtedly affected the overall strength and quality of his voice but nevertheless under these circumstances we were able to appreciate the interpretation of the innate quality of the songs.

David Roberts

Leamington Festival, Friday to Sunday, 3 to 5 May 2024 – A Personal Reflection

What a weekend!  Wonderful Czech music and outstanding Czech musicians who made a real impression on me. My weekend started on the Friday evening with the Guarneri Trio performing music by Suk, Smetana and Dvořák.  Our starter, Suk’s Elegy Op. 23, was peaceful, charming and unknown to me. The main course was Smetana’s tragic Piano Trio Op. 15 which was played throughout with sympathetic understanding of the trio’s sentiment. After the interval, we heard Dvořák’s Brahmsian F Minor Piano Trio Op 65. Ever since studying the Smetana and the Dvořák in my student days, I have loved these pieces and I can just about hum them both all the way through. I did so, silently of course, enjoying every bar even when joining in with their rubato. I am reminded that Smetana only wrote three significant chamber works and each is masterful and distinct. His reputation rests with his operas and Má vlast; although he composed symphonic poems and much salon music too. And, of course, Dvořák’s mature chamber works are the equal of Brahms, Mendelssohn, Schumann and Tchaikovsky. This evening’s performances left nothing to be desired. The Guarneri Trio’s utter passion for the music came through and reflected their nearly forty years of playing together. I drove home happily and contented.

Saturday morning’s Coffee Concert began with Erwin Schulhoff’s Five Piece for String Quartet and we have moved into the twentieth century. The Kukal Quartet played this extensive work taking on the dance rhythms with exuberance and animation.  Next was Sylvie Bodorová’s String Quartet No. 4 ‘Shofarot’ . The programme notes are written by the composer and inform us that the three movements reflect the ways of playing the shofar which is an instrument associated with Jewish religious ritual. The music uses modern techniques and I found it interesting to follow the piece guided by her descriptive notes. Sylvie was sitting in front of me and then as she took her place on the stage I could see that she was obviously very pleased with the performance. After the interval another Smetana chamber work – String Quartet No. 2 in D minor. This quartet is autobiographical and was composed near the end of his life.  I thought the Kukal Quartet’s animated performance had warmth and intensity. There was passion right from the opening bars. In contrast, the concert ended with four of Dvořák’s Cypresses.

Afterwards, I deliberately sat next to the bandstand in the park (which I knew from early childhood bank holiday visits by train) and was joined by Tomy Duby and his wife; we chatted about Czech music and Slovakia. The social dimension of the festival is important. The AGM business went well. I was particularly looking forward to the Dvořák in England talk because I grew up in Birmingham in the 1960s and was a very frequent visitor to the town hall to hear the CBSO. I knew that The Spectre’s Bride and the Requiem were commissioned for and performed in Birmingham with the composer conducting. An interesting question on Dvořák’s competence in English was discussed and well answered. Thank you, David Beveridge!

Saturday evening’s concert was given by the Martinů String Quartet with Martin Kasík (piano) and Vilém Veverka (oboe). After Mozart’s Oboe Quartet in F K370, we were treated to Sylvie Bodorová’s  Psalms and Exhortations; Concerto for Oboe and String Quartet – a world première performance commissioned by the Dvořák Society for the 50^th anniversary. This was an amazing and stimulating piece. Bodorová writes in the programme ‘in every concerto it is necessary to present the technical possibilities of the instrument’. She did just that and Vilém was up to it, giving a stunning and dramatic performance admirably accompanied by the String Quartet. After the interval, we heard a full-blooded performance of Dvořák’s Piano Quintet in A Op. 81. I am very fond of this piece and drove home humming it in the car. This concert was supported by our society.

On Sunday morning five us of paid our respects to Ian Trufitt at his grave in nearby Wilmcote. (Pictures on the society’s Facebook page.) My fourth and final concert on Sunday evening, entitled A Bohemian Pot Pourri, was again given by the Martinů String Quartet joined by Martin Kasík and Vilém Veverka. There was more fabulous oboe playing in Martinů’s Quartet for Oboe, Violin, Cello and Piano H315 and a three movement Suite for Oboe and Piano by Pavel Haas featuring quotes from the Wenceslas Chorale and the Hussite Hymn. The first half concluded with Gideon Klein’s Wiegenlied and Smetana’s From The Homeland for violin and piano. In the second half, we heard Dvořák’s serene Silent Woods Op. 68 No. 5 followed by Humoreska in G flat Op. 101 No. 7. I thoroughly enjoyed Dvořák’s Terzetto with the three string players standing in a semi-circle giving a rendition that superbly demonstrated ensemble skills of the highest order. The concert ended with Martinů’s gentle Mazurka-Nocturne H325 with yet another contribution by Vilém Veverka. My weekend of fantastic Czech musicians, a wonderful mix of composers and brilliant ensemble playing was over.

John Beale

Dvořák Society Annual General Meeting

Leamington Music Festival: Monday 6^th May at 11 am and 12.30 pm

On our final day at the Leamington Music Festival 20204, we enjoyed the acoustics and architecture of two beautiful Leamington Spa churches, All Saints and Holy Trinity.  In the morning at All Saints, we also appreciated the talents of two local musicians, the trumpet player, Imogen Whitehead and organist, Oliver Hancock in a varied and unusual concert.

Then came a more complex work: Okna (‘Windows’) by Petr Eben, composed for trumpet and organ and inspired by the blue, green, red and gold stained-glass windows of Marc Chagall in the Hadassah-Hebrew University Medical Centre in Jerusalem.  We had useful descriptions of this expressive music in our programmes.  All I needed was a representation of the actual windows.  So I have looked them up on the internet, and in order to refresh my memory, listened to a recording on YouTube by two young Austrian musicians, Daniel Schinnerl-Schläffer (trumpet) and Florian Kaier (organ)   YouTube. The performance in Leamington on 6^th May certainly equalled this one.

In contrast, there followed an arrangement for organ of Vltava from Má Vlast.  As the piece progressed, I looked up to admire the splendid architecture and this enhanced the music which resounded in the church. Finally, Imogen and Oliver played an arrangement for trumpet and organ of Hummel’s Trumpet Concerto in E flat. The different accompanying instrumentation of this famous work invited the audience to hear it clearly with fresh ears.  

Thank you, Imogen and Oliver, for skilfully presenting such an interesting programme with clear explanations, too.

They began the concert with the colourful Sonatina for Horn and Piano by the 20^th century Czech composer, Jaroslav Kofroň.  It was followed by the contrasting Adagio from the Horn Concerto in F no. 5 in F by 18th-century composer and virtuoso musician, Giovanni Punto, who was really Jan Václav Stich, born in Bohemia, but travelled widely in Europe using his more exotic Italian name.  Ben and Richard played both pieces with expression and precision, holding my attention throughout.

Richard then gave an evocative performance of Vítězslava Kaprálová’s impressionistic April Preludes, followed by three contrasting pieces from Janáček’s On an Overgrown Path, namely Our Evenings, They Chattered like Swallows and Good Night.  Although I have frequently heard these pieces, I thought that Richard brought considerable freshness to the April Preludes in particular.

The recital concluded with both musicians giving a spirited rendition of Beethoven’s Horn Sonata in F, Op. 17, a successful piece which also has versions for other instruments, such as cello, violin and even viola.  However, the beauty of the horn was certainly evident in Ben’s interpretation.    Apparently, it was composed for and first performed by Giovanni Punto, whose Adagio we had heard earlier.  Allegedly, Beethoven composed the part for horn the day before the concert in Vienna and successfully improvised the piano part.  Richard’s collaboration in the performance was appropriately assured.

This concert was dedicated to the memory of Ben’s grandmother, Irena Goldscheider, a member of the Dvořák Society, who passed away in 2023. Thank you, Ben and Richard, for remembering her with this varied and expressive recital.

Susan Jenkinson

Leamington Music Festival on Monday, 6 May 2024, afternoon and evening  

On Monday afternoon the Leamington History Group did an hour-long walk showing us local places connected with the 4000 soldiers of the Czechoslovak Free Army who from October 1940 were stationed there. Seven of them were trained and parachuted in 1941 to Nazi-occupied Bohemia. In May of the next year, they fatally wounded Reinhard Heydrich, the acting governor of Bohemia and Moravia. They were killed in an ambush in the Church of St Cyril and St Methodius in Prague.

The Martinů String Quartet and two guests brought this festival to a wonderful finale. It was in the Holy Trinity Church at the northern end of Parade. 

The concert started with Coventry, a Meditation for String Quartet by Vilém Tauský, who, as we learned in the afternoon walk, lived just across the park. What we heard was the string quartet version. Tauský wrote it after he was deployed there after the bombing of Coventry in November 1940. On YouTube, there are several recordings of this composition played by a string orchestra. I do not know which version to prefer. But the ladies and gentlemen of the Martinů Quartet performed it beautifully in this church, its acoustics helped!

Hans Krása’s String Quartet No. 2 followed. This is an early composition when he was 22. I wish I could hear it again to be able to review it.

Sylvie Bodorová’s Terezín Ghetto Requiem closed the first half of the concert. Baritone Simon Wallfisch joined the Martinů String Quartet.

The Requiem consists of four parts carrying the names of sections of Roman Catholic Requiem Mass. The first one, Lacrymosa, was set to the words of the Hebrew prayer Shema Israel (Hear, O Israel). Similarly to Tauský’s Meditation, on YouTube there are several recordings of string orchestra and baritone. But none matches in its delicacy and sensitivity how Simon Wallfisch blended with the sound of the Martinů String Quartet.

After the break, Gemma Rosefield joined the Martinů Quartet as the second cello in Schubert’s String Quintet in C, D956. There could be hardly a more contrasting composition to the first part of the concert. It was the only one performed during the two days we attended this festival that I knew well. The Quintet was wonderfully performed. The only comment I have is that in the acoustics of this church, the clarity of fast passages was lost. I was longing for the Royal Pump Rooms with their perfect acoustics!

After the music stopped we were invited to celebrate the work of Richard Phillips and his wife Veronica. Both were retiring from leading the Leamington Music. What a memorable way to close this festival and the celebrations of 50 Years of the Dvořák Society!

Tomy Duby