Four Legends, Op.59

Dvorák’s Legends are a direct result of the success of the first set of Slavonic Dances, Op.46, which he had written for the Berlin publisher Simrock in 1878. They had proved be such good sellers that two years later Simrock asked him for something else on the same lines, another set of short pieces based on distinctively Czech material to be issued both in their original form as piano duets and in the composer’s own orchestral arrangements. Dvorák chose the title Legends for the new work not so much, one suspects, to indicate that there is a story behind each one as to warn his piano-duettists at home and his listeners in the concert hall to expect something different from the Slavonic Dances. Certainly, they are more intimately expressive, quietly seductive rather than overtly exciting but no less attractive for that.

There might be some kind of story behind No.4 in C major (not included in today’s selection), which is the longest piece in the set and is constructed in a quite different way from the others. Most of them assume a ternary pattern, with matching outer sections and a contrasting middle section - which is not the most convenient form for telling a story. They do have their poetic aspects, however, like the idyllic middle section of No.6 in C sharp minor which is otherwise based on a fervently Brahms-like melody introduced by cellos in the opening bars. No.7 in A major is a more playful inspiration beginning with a graceful violin tune which experiences an unexpectedly dramatic development and then gives way to an extrovert middle section before it is recalled in its original form. It is entirely characteristic of Dvorák’s relaxed attitude in the Legends that he chose to end the set with the most leisurely piece of them all, No.10 in B flat minor, based on two alternating melodies, the second even more at ease than the first. The present selection, however, ends No.8 in F major which, though it too makes a leisurely start, offers distinctly more robust contrasts and an emphatic little coda.