Dvořák's belief in the power of folk music?
Folk music, my friends, is the purest spring from which true art flows. It is not something invented in dusty studies; it is the breath of life itself, the rhythm of the dance, the melody of a lullaby sung by a mother. In every village, every song, there is a whole nation's soul laid bare. When I travelled through Bohemia, and later through America, I listened. I heard the stories, the joys, the sorrows in their tunes. To weave these into my symphonies, my quartets – that is to give them lasting voice, to make them live for all time, as I tried to do with my 'American' String Quartet.
Ask Antonín Dvořák the follow-up →