#165 Musings Beyond the Bunker (Saturday October 9)
Good morning,
I have been duly chastised by Howard Kroll, Renee Marlin-Barnett and Alan Rosenbach for missing one of the greatest of all folk-inspired symphonic pieces of all time, “Die Moldau” (or “The Moldau”), by Smetana. It is a tone poem that is based upon the Moldava River, which begins in the Bohemian forest and ends near Prague. I am particularly embarrassed I omitted this piece, because this is one of my favorite pieces of music. So enamored am I by Smetana that I dragged the family to a statue of the great Czech composer in Prague.
Here is “The Moldau”, in all its glory, with the Vienna Philharmonic under Maestro Daniel Barenboim:
THE TONE POEM
The visual images intended by the piece are expressed on Britannica on-line (abbreviated here: The movement starts with light, rippling figures that represent the emergence of the Moldau River as two mountain springs, one warm and one cold, combine into a mighty river, symbolized by a thickly orchestrated, stately theme that recurs. Farther downstream, the river passes jubilant hunters, portrayed by a horn melody, and then passes a village wedding, signaled by a passage in polka rhythm. The river then enters a gorge where water nymphs come out to bathe in the moonlight to a more mysterious melody. With the morning light, the main river theme returns, though it soon breaks into tumultuous dissonance, as the river enters the St. John’s Rapids. Beyond the white water, the river reaches Prague, where to grand arpeggios of a regal hymn, it flows past a castle that was once the seat of power for Bohemian kings. After fading to a trickle, the piece—and the journey—comes to an unambiguous close with a loud two-chord cadence.
THE NAZIS DIDN’T LIKE IT
The Moldau became a national “anthem” of sorts (it’s part of a three-movement piece called “My Country”). When Hitler invaded the Czech Republic, Czech symphonies played this piece as a statement of passive resistance. He eventually banned the playing of The Moldau in an attempt to break the spirit of the Czech people.
BORROWED MELODY
What is particularly great about The Moldau is that it is proof of “globalization” before the term was popularized. The basic tune comes from a Romanian folk song and, before that, an earlier Italian tune that borrowed from folk music. The Israeli national anthem, “Hatikvah” is based in part on the Romanian folk tune. In fact, so similar are they that, during the British mandate of Palestine, when “Hatikvah” was banned on the radio, the people circumvented the ban by playing “Die Moldau” instead.
Here is the Romanian folksong upon which Die Moldau and Hatikvah are based, called “Carul cu boi” translated as “Cart and Oxen”:
, and here is another version where the melody enters earlier:
Although the Romanian tune is beloved by the Romanians as Romanian in origin and the Czechs see The Moldau as their national tune, all of these songs derive from an Italian tune by Gasparo Zanetti from 1645. It allegedly was “borrowed” by Mozart, ultimately making it to Vienna and Smetana:
. But the best part of the history is that even Zanetti “borrowed” the tune from folk songs that were extant decades earlier.
POETRY—THE ROMANIAN FOLKSONG’S LYRICS
Here are the lyrics to “Cart and Oxen,” which are evocative of a bygone era and are, in their way, sad, as the author longs for simpler days:
Before electricity
Train tracks and steams
Were discovered
Everything went smoothly
Because the elders were carefree
They were leading the ox driven cart
To the left, to the right! To the left, to the right!
To the left, to the right! To the left, to the right!
Today we fly on the train tracks
In boxy wagons
We arrive (to the destination) with broken heads
Famished and frozen
It’s better to lead an ox driven cart
Than to have so many worries
To the left, to the right! To the left, to the right!
To the left, to the right! To the left, to the right!
Have a great weekend,
Glenn
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