Vítezslav Novák was a student of Dvorák and his most adventurous follower. Pianist Jan Barto? is right to bemoan Novák's general neglect, even in the Czech Republic, but several recordings have covered his major tone poems. One of those, Toman and the Wood Nymph, Op. 40, is here, rendered with appropriate sweep by the Prague Radio Symphony Orchestra under Jakub Hru?a. The work is recognizably in the tradition of the nature tone poems of Dvorák's later career, but advances upon their language to a striking degree for 1907, ...
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Vítezslav Novák was a student of Dvorák and his most adventurous follower. Pianist Jan Barto? is right to bemoan Novák's general neglect, even in the Czech Republic, but several recordings have covered his major tone poems. One of those, Toman and the Wood Nymph, Op. 40, is here, rendered with appropriate sweep by the Prague Radio Symphony Orchestra under Jakub Hru?a. The work is recognizably in the tradition of the nature tone poems of Dvorák's later career, but advances upon their language to a striking degree for 1907, when it was composed: one might almost take it for Szymanowski, and its vast programmatic canvas and harmonic spirit of adventure are fascinating even as it contains little of Novák's other main innovation, folk rhythmic influence. The piano works here are a bit less distinctive, but Barto? plays them for all they are worth. Both are early works: the Piano Concerto in E minor was disowned by the composer, who heard only its conventional aspects and not the hints of Impressionism that...
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