Smetana, Bedřich << SMEH tah nah, BEH dur zhihk >> (1824-1884), was a Czech composer. He and Antonín Dvořák are considered founders of the Czech national school of music. Smetana’s eight operas established the Czech national operatic tradition. The most popular of these operas is The Bartered Bride (1866), though the most patriotic is Libuse (1872). His cycle of six symphonic poems, Ma Vlast (My Fatherland, 1879) is also famous. It includes the familiar River Moldau. Smetana composed the autobiographical String Quartet in E minor, From My Life (1876), which influenced later quartets by the Czech composer Leoš Janáček.
Loading the player...The Bartered Bride Overture
Smetana was born on March 2, 1824, in Litomyśl, Bohemia, near Pardubice. He grew up speaking German, but joined Czech patriots in an unsuccessful 1848 revolution against Prussian domination. From 1866 to 1874, he served as conductor of the National Theatre in Prague, where he introduced many new Czech, German, and French operas. He died on May 12, 1884.
Loading the player...River Moldau by Bedřich Smetana
