FROM MY LIFE

March 14, 2024 | Bohemian National Hall

Alexander Sitkovetsky, violin

Nicholas Canellakis, cello

Wu Qian, piano

Illustrated talk by Nicholas Chong

Antonín Dvořák - Sonatina in G major for violin and piano, Op. 100 B. 183

Ludwig van Beethoven - Violin Sonata No. 7, Op. 30 No. 2

Bedřich Smetana - Piano Trio in G Minor, Op.15

Photographs by Alex Fedorov © 2024

How does one express one’s innermost self? Music has a way of subverting our conscious intentions and getting straight to the truth; it conveys complex emotions without revealing a composer’s personal narrative. And yet, once a particular autobiographical aspect of a work is revealed, it affects the way we listen. Dvořák’s Sonatina for violin and piano, Op. 100 was written during his three-year stay in New York as the director of that city’s National Conservatory. This period, while productive and successful, was tainted by nostalgia for his beloved Bohemia. Dvořák was anxious to go home, and that feeling is transparent in his sunny, innocent Sonatina. Beethoven’s Violin Sonata No. 7 in C minor, Op. 30 No. 2 was written in 1802, by which time the composer’s hearing was beginning to seriously deteriorate. In October of that year, he wrote the Heiligenstadt Testament, in which he confessed his despair over his condition and his suicidal thoughts. This sonata, written in Beethoven’s ‘tragic key’ of C minor, seems to be directly related to this crisis. Smetana’s G minor Piano Trio movingly tells a story of tragedy and loss: within one year he lost two of his daughters. The trio is considered his first great achievement as a composer, but above all it is a deeply personal narrative. Each of the works presented in this program tells a story from a life; each, moreover, is a manifestation of a personal crisis.