12 / 40
The rising tide of Czech nationalism had a radical effect on Bedřich
Smetana’s personality, consequently influencing the whole of his
musical output. He was not the only Czech composer to express such
heated nationalism, but he was the most brilliant of the pioneers
and creators of a hitherto inexistent national art. Smetana and his
contemporaries assimilated not only Germanic culture, from Bach to
Brahms, but also the Austrian filiation from Mozart onwards, and the
compositions of Liszt and Wagner, to which they were very strongly
drawn.
He was the first composer to look into Bohemian musical sources, to
use the Czech language in his opera librettos (seen as provocation
by the Austrian authorities) and to seek out regional rhythms and
melodies. Unlike Dvořák, who invented his own local flavours, Smetana
dipped his pen into the realism and spontaneity of folk music. His
operatic works, and even more so, perhaps, his piano pieces (the
virtuosity of which puts them on a par with those of Liszt), show not
only a revolutionary musician, but also one who was fascinated by the
sounds of former times.