The Bohemian Music
By Jar. E. S. Vojan, LL. D.
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N Smetana’s opera “Dalibor” the old jail-keeper, when sending a violin to the imprisoned knight, says: “What Bohemian would not love music?” And that was always a full truth from the sixth century, when the Slavic tribes came from the northeast and settled in the country known as Bohemia to the present day.
Of the great number of old religious songs we mention only two—“Hospodine pomiluj ny” (“Lord, Have Mercy,”—from the end of the tenth century) and “Svatý Václave” (St. Václav,”—a beautiful Phrygian melody from about 1300). Well known is the majestic war-song of the Hussites” “Kdo jste boží bojovníci”, (All ye warriors of God,—a doric song of an extraordinary energetic character). The notations of the folk songs reach also very far, the first ones being from the fifteenth century.
The first book on musical theory in the Bohemian language was published in 1558. “Musica” by Jan Blahoslav, one of the most prominent of the Bohemian Brethren and an excellent musician, is a very valuable work.
After the battle of White Mountain in 1620 Bohemia lost her independence, the capital Prague, which under Charles IV (1346–1378) had become the heart of central Europe, was pushed into the background, and the population of the rebel country came to poverty. Many Bohemian musicians enjoying the best renown went to foreign countries, and some of them became famous in the history of music, e. g., Jan Stanitz (1717–1761), founder of the classic form of symphony at Mannheim, Jiří Benda (1722–1795), creator of the modern melodrama, and Josef Mysliveček (1737–1781), called in Italy “il divino Boemo” (known also under the Italian name Venatorini).
In the eighteenth century the style of Bohemian music begins to show a strongly marked national character, both in the melodies and their harmonic treatment.
The composers who may be especially mentioned are as follows: Jan Dismas Zelenka, the greatest Bohemian composer of the first half of the eighteenth century, born
