Smetana Ma Vlast

The Czech Philharmonic and it's Chief Conductor and Music Director Semyon Bychkov present a new recording of Bedrich Smetana's masterpiece Ma vlast (My Homeland). The album celebrates both the bicentenary of Smetana's birth and, the start of 2024's Year of Czech Music which has been celebrated every ten years since Smetana's 100th anniversary in 1924. Ma vlast (1874-1878) is a potent symbol of the Czech Republic's turbulent political history and has played an important role in the Czech national movement. Contemplating the landscape, history, and legends of Bohemia, Ma vlast is best known for it's world-famous Moldau melody.

The Czech Philharmonic and it's Chief Conductor and Music Director Semyon Bychkov present a new recording of Bedrich Smetana's masterpiece Ma vlast (My Homeland). The album celebrates both the bicentenary of Smetana's birth and, the start of 2024's Year of Czech Music which has been celebrated every ten years since Smetana's 100th anniversary in 1924. Ma vlast (1874-1878) is a potent symbol of the Czech Republic's turbulent political history and has played an important role in the Czech national movement. Contemplating the landscape, history, and legends of Bohemia, Ma vlast is best known for it's world-famous Moldau melody.

Widely regarded as Bedrich Smetana's greatest hit, The Moldau is but one part of the orchestral cycle Má Vlast (My Country), which contains six tone poems on different Czech nationalist subjects. Smetana composed these epic works in the manner of Franz Liszt's tone poems, evoking dramatic images through colorful orchestration and painting natural and historical scenes through themes and harmonies of a pronounced Bohemian character. One might suppose that only a Czech orchestra could play this music with the proper intensity, but the Malaysian Philharmonic Orchestra, under Claus Peter Flor, gives a stirring account that can rival any performance anywhere for energy, passion, and atmosphere.

The Czech Philharmonic and it's Chief Conductor and Music Director Semyon Bychkov present a new recording of Bedrich Smetana's masterpiece Ma vlast (My Homeland). The album celebrates both the bicentenary of Smetana's birth and, the start of 2024's Year of Czech Music which has been celebrated every ten years since Smetana's 100th anniversary in 1924. Ma vlast (1874-1878) is a potent symbol of the Czech Republic's turbulent political history and has played an important role in the Czech national movement. Contemplating the landscape, history, and legends of Bohemia, Ma vlast is best known for it's world-famous Moldau melody.

Má Vlast is undoubtedly one of the best known works of Smetana even when knowledge is restricted to the tone poems, 'The Moldau' and 'Bohemia's Woods and Fields'. The work is not of ideal length for a CD, running to just a few minutes over its capacity and necessitating two CDs if played unabridged or unhurried. Of the many versions available perhaps three of the best are Kubelik, Mackerras and Talich.

James Levine's viennese recording of Smetana's famed masterpiece is one of the best performances of the work around today. With clear, full-bodied digital recording and ripe, rich and opulent playing from the Vienna Philharmonic Orchestra, it presents a performance that is as comporable to Kubelik as any other. Despite Levine's roots in the theatre (Metropolitan Opera), he manages to grasp a clear sense of drama in the work, and while some might argue that he is mainly concerned with orchestral effect for its own sake, he certainly does not do this but presents every minute detail in this musical kaliedascopic picture.

The great Czech conductor and his beloved orchestra perform a definitive Má vlast. In one of his last recording with the Czech Philharmonic, Jiří Bělohlávek conducts a heartfelt account of Smetana's great set of symphonic poems: Má vlast (My Homeland).