Antonin Dvorak – Go Retire Psychiatrist

I thought I would share a couple of ideas about the Czech composer Antonin Dvorak. I’m not a music expert by any stretch of the imagination, but I enjoy listening to classical music on the Music Choice Classical Masterpieces channel.

Music Choice always have interesting bits of biographical information about the musicians. The items about Dvorak are very interesting. For example, a couple of them mention that he had idiosyncrasies. One was that he stole all of the pencils at a place where he was supposed to be working because the pencils were “perfect for composing.” Another factoid is that he was fascinated with the trains in Prague and, in fact, had memorized the entire train schedule.

This makes me wonder if he was something more than eccentric and might have had some form of autism spectrum disorder (formerly Asperger’s Syndrome). On the other hand, I’ve always been a little suspicious of the Music Choice channel’s little biographical blurbs. I couldn’t verify from a quick internet search whether or not he had the disorder or not—and probably he didn’t.

On the other hand, Dvorak did visit Spillville, Iowa during the summer of 1893. There’s a short video which tells about his visit. One of the images shows a picture of a scarlet tanager, and the voice over mentions that Dvorak was often inspired by birdsong. In fact, there is an online reference to an anecdote about Dvorak basing one of his compositions, String Quartet in F major (op. 96, the ‘American’), on the song of a bird.

There was some controversy about whether it was more likely he based it on the song of the red-eyed vireo or that of a scarlet tanager. But after an extremely long article, the authors of the reference conclude that Dvorak’s composition was based on the song of the red-eyed vireo, which doesn’t resemble a scarlet tanager at all (McKone MJ, Beccue DA. The Iowa Bird That Inspired Antonín Dvořák’s American String Quartet in 1893: Controversy over the Species’ Identity and Why It Matters. Nineteenth-Century Music Review. 2021;18(3):521-537. doi:10.1017/S1479409820000282).

I’m an amateur bird-watcher and I’m pretty sure I’ve never heard or seen a red-eyed vireo. I have seen a scarlet tanager but I can’t remember what its song sounds like. I’m pretty sure Dvorak didn’t mistake either bird’s song with the well-known howl of Bigfoot, who may have been sneaking around Spillville, hunting for beef jerky.

Let’s see Music Choice channel try to add that to the anecdotes about Dvorak.

African Americans have made important contributions to classical music, as I pointed out in the post about Samuel Coleridge-Taylor a couple of months ago. I know a little about classical music although I remember the major composers the way many do, by the 4 Bs: Brahms, Bach, Beethoven, and Bigfoot. Bigfoot could really wail, and still does according to some people. Who could forget his iconic and literal smash hit, “Knock 3 times on a Tree Trunk if You Fear Me” (Opus 3, No. 7, adagio on rye in G-Minor)?

Seriously, it turns out that there is an Iowa Connection for an African American musician, Harry T. Burleigh, who influenced Antonin Dvorak’s Symphony No. 9, ‘From the New World.’ I listened to the work for first time in my life as I wrote this post. Burleigh was an accomplished composer, arranger, and baritone vocalist. He sang traditional spirituals, which inspired Dvorak to say “In the negro melodies of America I discover all that is needed for a great and noble school of music.” It is reported by some writers that the Largo of Symphony 9 was influenced by spiritual music. I think even my untrained ear caught that.

Anyway, Dvorak visited Spillville, Iowa back in the summer of 1893. He lived on the second floor of what is now the Dvorak Exhibit and the Bily Clock Museum. A Des Moines Register article published in 2018 mentioned him going for walks along the Turkey River and played the organ for the local church congregation. He carried “his little bucket of beer like everybody did back in the day,” according to a member of a Spillville historical group. David Neely, music director and principal conductor of the Des Moines Metro Opera, said Dvorak “…left a legacy in this country. Not many composers did things like that.” And I would add that Harry T. Burleigh left a legacy in this country as well. Not many people do things like that.

Unfortunately, despite having an impressive funeral after his death in 1949, he was initially buried in an unmarked grave in White Plains, New York. He was later given a proper internment in the Erie Cemetery in Pennsylvania.

There is only one surviving recording of him singing “Go Down Moses.” It’s on YouTube. One of his biographers, Jean E. Snyder, commented that Burleigh himself did not care for the recording. He wrote the definitive arrangement of many Negro Spirituals including “Lift Every Voice and Sing” and “Deep River.”