Dvořák: Cello Concerto, Op. 104 | Marie-Elisabeth Hecker & Orchestre Philharmonique de Monte-Carlo

One of the most popular works of cello music ever: Here, Antonín Dvořák’s Cello Concerto in B minor, Op. 104 is played by German cellist Marie-Elisabeth Hecker with great concentration and dedication. She is accompanied by the Orchestre Philharmonique de Monte-Carlo, under the baton of Yakov Kreizberg. The performance was recorded at the Prince’s Palace of Monaco in 2009.

(00:00) Allegro
(15:25) Adagio, ma non troppo
(27:23) Finale. Allegro moderato

It is said that the Czech composer Antonín Dvořák described the cello as "a piece of wood that squeaks at the top and growls at the bottom." He discovered his love for the instrument in the US. Dvořák composed his Cello Concerto in B minor, Op. 104 between 1894 and 1895, at the end of a three-year stay in the US.

Just as Dvořák was reluctant to play the cello as a solo instrument, he was also initially reluctant to relocate to America. In June 1891, he was offered the position of music director at the newly founded National Conservatory in New York. Dvořák declined, as he had just started a position as a professor at the Prague Conservatory. In 1892, he accepted the US offer after all, lured by the high salary.

Regarded as a representative of the Czech national style in his home country, Dvořák was to establish a new, independent American musical culture in the US. Antonín Dvořák's 9th Symphony "From the New World" is considered a prime example of this. Nevertheless, the sounds of his native Bohemia also flowed into his works in the US. The extent to which he missed his homeland is particularly evident in his cello concerto.

In the second movement of the concerto, Antonín Dvořák quotes one of his songs, "Lasst mich allein" (Leave me Alone) (Op. 82), which he had written for his secret and unrequited childhood sweetheart Josefina Kounicová, the sister of his future wife. In America, Dvořák had learned that his sister-in-law was seriously ill. She died in May 1895. After his return to his home country, Dvořák changed the coda of the last movement. In this movement he also refers to Czech folklore and again quotes the song "Laßt mich allein."

Antonín Dvořák dedicated the cello concerto to his friend, the great cellist Hanuš Wihan who was supposed to play the solo part at the premiere. But a dispute arose. Wihan wanted to make many changes and even wrote a cadenza for the concerto himself against Dvořák's wishes. At the premiere in March 1896, the English cellist Lio Stern played the solo. Dvořák was on the podium and conducted the Royal Philharmonic Society in London.

Marie-Elisabeth Hecker was born in Zwickau in 1987. She discovered her passion for playing the cello early on in life. Already at the age of five, she began taking cello lessons at the Robert-Schumann-Konservatorium in her hometown. Starting in 1999, she won several “Jugend musiziert” musical competitions. She went to school at the Sächsisches Landesgymnasium für Musik Dresden, and in 2005 she started studying at the Hochschule für Musik und Theater “Felix Mendelssohn Bartholdy” Leipzig. Her success in the 2005 Rostropowitsch Competition in Paris went down as her breakthrough moment: There – for the first time in the history of the competition – she won both first prize and two special prizes. Today, she performs with the most famous orchestras and conductors in the word, including the Deutsches Symphonie-Orchester Berlin, the Filarmonica della Scala, the Orchestre National de France, the Gewandhausorchester Leipzig, Daniel Barenboim, Philippe Herreweghe, Kent Nagano and Christian Thielemann.

© Karl More Production France / Orchestre Philharmonique de Monte-Carlo 2010

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