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<\/a><\/p>\nHorowitz and Beckerman: Hiawatha Melodrama (after Dvo\u0159\u00e1k)<\/strong> Naxos 8.559777 (76:41)<\/strong><\/p>\n It has long been known that Dvo\u0159\u00e1k\u2019s New World Symphony was inspired by African-American and Native American music. And Dvo\u0159\u00e1k himself mentioned Longfellow\u2019s The Song of<\/em> Hiawatha<\/em> as another source of inspiration. But most musicians and musicologists were reluctant to be more specific than that. In recent years, however, the musicologists Joseph Horowitz and Michael Beckerman have tried to show that all of these elements, especially the Hiawatha story, can be linked to specific passages in the New World Symphony.<\/p>\n Beckerman\u2019s 2003 book New Worlds of Dvo\u0159\u00e1k <\/em>lays out all the evidence but Horowitz and Beckerman went even further in creating a Hiawatha Melodrama incorporating music from the symphony and other Dvo\u0159\u00e1k pieces. I first heard a version of it in a Horowitz-curated Dvo\u0159\u00e1k Festival at the University of Texas about ten years ago. I was not entirely convinced but I enjoyed the presentation immensely. This latest version on a new Naxos CD is even better than what I heard years ago and I am sure it will appeal to many music-lovers who love the symphony and thought they knew what it was all about.<\/p>\n Let\u2019s be very clear about one thing. In spite of Horowitz and Beckerman\u2019s research, Dvo\u0159\u00e1k\u2019s New World Symphony is not program music. In other words, it was not conceived as a story told in music as in Liszt\u2019s or Richard Strauss\u2019 symphonic poems, or even as in Dvo\u0159\u00e1k\u2019s own later tone poems such as The Noonday Witch<\/em> or The<\/em> Water Goblin<\/em>. This is \u201cabsolute\u201d music whose movements are easily analyzed as being in traditional forms (e.g. the sonata form first movement). But certain musical episodes can be related to passages in Longfellow\u2019s poem and made to complement each other.<\/p>\n For me, however, the process breaks down when I see how arbitrarily the arrangers have chosen music to fit the words. They chop up the New World Symphony to suit the Hiawatha narrative and even bring in passages from other Dvo\u0159\u00e1k works such as the Larghetto movement from the Sonatina for Violin and Piano. It seems to me that rather than making the case that Dvo\u0159\u00e1k\u2019s music was composed to express specific passages from the Song of Hiawatha<\/em>, they do no more than show that some of Dvo\u0159\u00e1k\u2019s music works quite well as an accompaniment to parts of the Song of Hiawatha<\/em>; and that is a very different thing. To put it another way, Horowitz and Beckerman are doing what most film directors do when they choose music to accompany words and images. And the fact is that music by other composers would work just as well as Dvo\u0159\u00e1k\u2019s New World Symphony as a \u201csoundtrack\u201d for Song of Hiawatha.<\/em><\/p>\n The Hiawatha Melodrama is narrated by Kevin Deas in a style that recalls the old-fashioned stage actors of the early Twentieth Century. It is a sing-song style which has long since gone out of fashion. I am reminded of Benjamin de Loache narrating Poe\u2019s The Raven<\/em> to music by Dubensky on a 1936 recording conducted by Stokowski. Otherwise the performances are all very good. But, of course, Song of Hiawatha<\/em> is itself pretty dated.<\/p>\n Dvo\u0159\u00e1k\u2019s intent was to show American composers how they could use their own indigenous music to enrich their compositions and produce a genuinely American music. In general, not many composers learned much from Dvo\u0159\u00e1k. But Arthur Farwell (1872-1952) was one who did and two of his pieces inspired by Native American music are included on this CD. The fact is, however, that while American composers were slow to find their voice, within twenty years or so of Dvo\u0159\u00e1k\u2019s death we had the fresh and original music of Ives, Copland, Gershwin and all that jazz.<\/p>\n This CD is available for purchase at Amazon.com<\/a>.<\/p>\n
\nDvo\u0159\u00e1k: American Suite\/Violin Sonatina<\/strong>
\nFarwell: Navajo War Dance No. 2\/Pawnee Horses<\/strong>
\nKevin Deas, narrator\/Benjamin Pasternak, piano\/PostClassical Ensemble\/Angel Gil-Ord\u00f3\u00f1ez<\/strong><\/p>\n