American Suite (Dvořák)

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The American Suite (opus 98b, 1895) is an orchestral suite by Czech composer Antonín Dvořák.

Dvořák initially wrote the Suite for piano (opus 98). While he composed it in New York between February 19 and March 1, 1894,^[1] he orchestrated it in two parts more than a year after his return to the United States and immediately before his departure for Europe. The pianistic version was performed soon after its composition, but the orchestral version waited several years: the American Suite was first played in concert in 1910 and not published until 1911, seven years after Dvořák's death.

The suite is written in five movements, each with a marked rhythm:

Molto vivace
Allegro
Moderato (alla Pollacca)
Andante
Allegro

As often is the case with Dvořák, the orchestral version gives the work a new breadth. The cyclic aspects of Dvořák's composition are apparent, in that the principal theme of the first movement recurs up through the conclusion of the work. This opening theme is marked by his American-influenced style. It is difficult to determine if it comes from the typical folk music of the New World or simply of the music of the Czech emigrants, to which the Director of the New York Conservatory liked to listen during his stay in the United States.

This mix of American influence with Slavic tradition is also perceptible in the rhythm of the "alla Polacca" third movement, and in the last movement's themes native to the Far East, played by flute and oboe in unison, where the orchestra passes easily from the minor theme to the major one.

Far from any exoticism, the art of Dvořák's orchestral work is in the field of pure music, and it is undoubtedly for this reason that Brahms appreciated it. Even in New York, when Dvořák encouraged his pupils to work on their own folk melodies, it was authentic recreation of the popular folk musics that he called for.