His father’s brewery and his home were directly opposite the Renaissance castle, now a UNESCO World Heritage Site, in Litomysl, 130 km east of Prague. He learned to play the violin and piano at an early age. His first public appearance was at the age of six. He also gave private concerts for Countess Maria Kagetan von Walstein-Warteberg in the castle’s drawing room, as its current administrator Jiri Weiss recounts. The piano where he played in these concerts can still be seen today. “It plays, but it will need to be repaired for concerts first,” Weiss says. His symphonic poem “Moldava” is one of the most popular classical hits worldwide. Today, March 2, Czech national composer Bedrich or Friedrich Smetana would have turned 200 years old. The great romantic composer spent his childhood years in various boarding schools and his life was not always easy.

His inspired work

After high school, Smetana studied composition in Prague against the wishes of his father, who believed that this art did not bring bread. He worked as a private tutor for aristocrats and founded a music school, but always struggled with financial problems. The romantic composer Franz Liszt, who was twelve years his senior, became his role model and friend. Smetana later found inspiration in the operas of Richard Wagner with the leading role of the orchestra. Women played an important role in his life and work as muses. He liked to dedicate his own pieces to them. Politically, he joined the rising Czech national movement, which claimed more rights to the Habsburg monarchy. He is even said to have fought on the roadblocks during the 1848 revolution against the Austrian Empire. Smetana, who had been baptized Friedrich, now used the name Bedrich. As a new study shows, the Czech written language with its complicated grammar and spelling caused him great difficulty and German was the only language of instruction during his school years.

One of Smetana’s most famous compositions is undoubtedly the symphonic poem “Moldava”, in Czech Vltava, from the cycle “My homeland”, which is very often studied in schools. Smetana himself wrote that the play follows “the Vltava River through forests and meadows and then into the countryside, where joyous feasts are celebrated, fairies dance in the moonlight, proud castles, stately houses and ruins appear on nearby cliffs.” . The Czech composer’s most frequently performed opera is The Bartered Bride, based on a libretto by Karel Sabina. It tells the story of young Marie, who is in love with Hans, but her parents want her to marry the son of a rich farmer. Smetana’s opera “Libuse” is almost never performed abroad and was performed at the National Theater in Prague only in 1881 and again in 1883 after a fire and reconstruction of the Theater. Few connoisseurs of his work know more about the opera “Dalibor”.

He is revered as a national saint

The death of three of his six daughters when they were young left him reeling. His first wife also died young and his second marriage dissolved. In 1874 Smetana lost his hearing completely. Nevertheless, the period that followed was one of the most fruitful. He sonically captured the excruciating tinnitus from which he suffered in the sharp sounds of the String Quartet no. 1 in E minor “From my life”, rarely performed, but considered one of his best works. Shortly before his death he was admitted to a psychiatric clinic in Prague, where he died on May 12, 1884. Many experts speculate that he suffered from syphilis, others suspect dementia due to arteriosclerosis or infection from trauma. His grave in Visegrad Cemetery still attracts classical music lovers from all over the world.

Smetana is considered the founder of Czech national music. Subsequent composers or musicians in his homeland had to contend with his work, either approving or criticizing it. In Prague, a museum and a transgressive statue of him near Charles Bridge honor the quasi-national saint. The classical music festival “Prague Spring” begins every year on the anniversary of Smetana’s death with the cycle “My Homeland”. His hometown hosts the international opera festival “Smetana’s Litomysl” every summer. Under the motto “Smetana200” this year a huge number of concerts and events are organized in the Czech Republic and abroad. The program also includes rarely performed works, such as his first opera “The Brandenburgers in Bohemia”.

Editor: Irini Anastasopoulou