first successes

Dvořák’s engagement in the Provisional Theatre Orchestra provided him with a wealth of inspiration via the numerous opportunities to perform various world operatic works and as yet isolated examples of Czech opera, which probably played a major role in his decision to try his hand, after chamber and symphonic works, at writing opera as well. As a completely unknown composer without any means he could not afford to commission a new libretto, and so he used an earlier text, Alfred der Grosse, penned by the Neo-Romantic German poet Karl Theodor Körner. Dvorak’s first opera Alfred was never performed during his lifetime. He soon began work on his second opera, King and Collier, which upon completion he then offered to the Provisional Theatre. After several rehearsals, however, the score was returned to him as unplayable, in response to which Dvořák rewrote the entire opera to the same text. The second musical setting was now regarded as feasible, and Dvořák was able to present himself in public as an opera composer for the first time. The decisive factor in sealing the composer’s reputation on home soil, however, was the extraordinary success of the performance in March 1873 of the Hymn “The Heirs of White Mountain”, set to a text by Vítězslav Hálek. With this work the hitherto anonymous violist in the Provisional Theatre Orchestra established himself as an original composer with a promising future whose success on this occasion motivated him to continue his composition work. Encouraged by the enthusiastic reviews of the Hymn he then turned out one work after another: Symphonies No. 3 in E flat major and No. 4 in D minor, three string quartets, the one-act comic opera The Stubborn Lovers and a number of other pieces, some of which did not survive.