Dvořák 8 & Lawrence Power plays Bartók

Fleeing World War II, Hungarian composer Béla Bartók spent his final years in America. Initially, he did not find it easy to settle there. Besides homesickness, illness and a desperate lack of money depressed him. However, his situation improved significantly in 1943 when he received a commission for what would later become his famous Concerto for Orchestra. After the premiere of this work, Bartók was approached by Scottish viola player William Primrose, who asked him to compose a viola concerto. In September 1945, Bartók, suffering from leukemia, wrote to Primrose that the sketches for the viola concerto were ready: "only the orchestral score remains to be written out, which is a purely mechanical task". However, three weeks later, Bartók passed away, leaving the concerto unfinished. It would take his friend and former student Tibor Serly two years to transform Bartók's collection of sketches into a playable score. The result? A virtuosic, masculine and sometimes sombre concerto, with an exhilarating finale reminiscent of the folk music that fascinated him so much in his youth.

Antonín Dvořák's Eighth Symphony, bathed in sunlight, brims with optimistism and vital energy. In terms of form, this work is directly influenced by Beethoven and Brahms. The content, however, is unmistakably Czech. A profusion of melodies inspired by Bohemian folk music lends the work a bucolic euphoria: how good it is to live in a world filled with natural wonders. Dvořák dedicated this symphony to the Academy of Sciences, Literature and Arts of Bohemia, which had elected him as one of its members. This symphony is sometimes subtitled the English, because the score was ultimately published in England (Dvořák having had issues with his assigned publisher).