I once conducted a concert which started with Dvorak’s great orchestral triptych- Nature, Life and Love. It reminded me of what is wrong with classical music. Dvorak wrote the 3 parts of this work as a carefully interconnected whole- together, they form a sort of manifesto of his philosophical outlook. Readers may recognize the 3 parts of this work as the overtures “In Nature’s Realm,” “Carnival’ and “Othello.” Or you may not. That is kind of the point.
So…. How does this piece illustrate what is “wrong” with classical music? Well, I’m a music guy. I have played and conducted in a fair number of concerts, and been to a fair number of concerts. As a cellist, I have probably played Carnival 50 times. Conducted it just twice. In concert, I’ve probably heard it another 50 times. I’ve probably heard “Nature’s Realm” in concert twice. Othello……
And how many times have I played/conducted/heard this piece as Dvorak meant it to be heard? 20? 4? 2?
ZERO.
Not only that- of the 90 or so musicians playing that Saturday, not a single person could remember ever hearing or playing a complete Nature, Life and Love. Everyone there had played/heard/seen Carnival more times than they cared to count.
The Decca recording of the great, great Istvan Kertesz recording of these three great overtures is close to definitive, but for one flaw….
The 3 overtures are spread across 2 discs. None are next to each other. People who love Dvorak enough to buy a double disc of his symphonic poems and overtyres (performed by one of the greatest Dvorak interpreters in history) deserve to better than to hear this important work chopped up into feeble, pointless bleeding chunks.
Really, people- this is what is wrong with the music world!?!?!?!
We treat people who love music with all their heart like clueless idiots. We turn thoughtful masterpieces into trite 9 minute tambourine concertos. The three overtures together are infinitely more interesting, compelling, challenging and rewarding than hacking through Carnival for the 9 millionth time while not getting the tambourine to play softly enough that anyone else can be heard. Nobody I talked to last week had EVER played Othello. Everyone had played Carnival. Carnival is a hoot (if you tame the tambourine- he was good on Saturday), but Othello is better, and Carnival is a scherzo, a mid-point in a larger story. It isn’t meant to stand on its own.
So, once again, I plead with conductors and programmers – don’t slice and dice poor Dvorak! Your listeners love Dvorak, so give them a full portion, not a meagre taste, nor the sauce with no steak.
A couple cases where they are together:
The Neumann Dvorak Symphony set has the three played back to back.
The Naxos comlete Dvorak also has them sequentially conducted by Antoni Wit.
First, not to spam your comments section with counterfactuals, but Vernon Handley recorded all three in sequence for Chandos back in the 1980’s (along with the Scherzo Capriccioso). Denby Richards provided some very good liner notes for it as well, which thanks to Chandos you can read here: https://www.chandos.net/chanimages/Booklets/CH8453.pdf
Second, I am very sympathetic to your larger point that music directors underestimate their audience’s appetite for more ambitious programming (I would put other things a little higher on the list of what’s wrong with classical music than this, however, though it is definitely on the list). I do wonder, though, how much of that is selection bias among the wonkier among us? Back when in-person concerts were a thing here in nyc I would regularly attend concerts that were pitched towards both “mainstream” and “connoisseur” audiences. It was always the former that were filled to capacity, and with more diverse audiences. The audience for the former were a mix of conservatory students and socially awkward nerds (like me). Is this not a case of music directors responding to market signals?
Also the Kubelik recording with the Bavarian Radio Symphony.