Josef Kajetán Tyl – incidental music, Op. 62, B125

Dvořák wrote the incidental music Josef Kajetán Tyl at the request of the management of the Provisional Theatre to accompany the play of the same name by František Ferdinand Šamberk. Šamberk’s play, depicting the beginnings of Czech theatre and the life of dramatist Josef Kajetán Tyl, is intensely patriotic, a fact also reflected in the stage music: It was Šamberk’s wish that, towards the end of each act, the audience would hear music derived from the themes of the song Where is my home? (today the Czech national anthem), whose text was the work of Tyl himself. The composer obliged but, in order to achieve the desired measure of contrast, he also used the melody of the Czech folk song In our courtyard yonder. The incidental music consists of eight parts: six passages of melodramatic music and two intermezzos. Dvořák also wrote an overture to the play, the only one still occasionally performed as a separate concert piece under the title My Home.