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

Opus number

62

Burghauser catalogue number

125

Date of composition

December 1881 – 23 January 1882

Premiere - date and place

3 February 1882, Prague

Premiere performer(s)

Provisional Theatre Orchestra, conductor Adolf Čech

First edition

Editio Supraphon, 1979, Prague

Instrumentation

2 flutes, 2 oboes, 2 clarinets, 2 bassoons, 4 horns, 2 trumpets, 3 trombones, timpani, bass drum, violins, violas, cellos, double basses

Parts / movements

1. Allegretto quasi polka
2. –
3. Enter'acte I (Allegro scherzando)
4. Andante con moto
5. –
6. Enter'acte II
7. Andante
8. -

Duration

approx. 14 min.

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.