Otakar Ostrčil and Mahler's Influence in Prague

Summary

TO WHOM DID THE FUTURE BELONG?

Otakar Ostrčil (25 February 1879 - 20 August 1935) was one of the figures in Czech musical life who acknowledged Bedřich Smetana's position in Czech music as undisputed, and who knew both Antonín Dvořák and Zdeněk Fibich as mature and remarkable composers. The deaths of Fibich in 1900 and Dvořák in 1904, perhaps too early and too unexpected, created space in the Czech musical “heavens” for the young generation, confronting them with numerous tasks: besides their own work as composers, they had to safeguard the legacy of their predecessors, to perfectly master the art of composing, to succeed abroad, and also to become top performers and organizers of musical life. Their fates were also affected by the unexpected vigor with which Otakar Hostinský's pupils dominated official discourse. The two founders of Czech musicology, Zdeněk Nejedlý and Vladimír Helfert, were well aware of the power of both spoken and written words; the escalation of the so-called “Dvořák battles” before the First World War was one of their more doubtful achievements. Thankfully, after he had settled in Brno, Helfert reassessed his earlier opinions; he was able to recognize Josef Suk's and especially Leoš Janáček's qualities. On the other hand, Nejedlý remained stubbornly determined: even in the new setting of an independent Czechoslovakia, he was unable to break away from his superficial judgments, making personal preferences and biases part of his music criticism.

The life paths of the musicians who emerged following the deaths of the founding troika (Smetana, Dvořák and Fibich) are in several ways almost too obviously similar: they boldly came to the forefront around 1900, they wrote a number of high-quality compositions before the First World War, and they did valuable work as performers, critics and teachers. After the war, they were overwhelmed by their work for important national institutions. This distracted them from further composing and sometimes quickened their retirement, or made them unable to build on their earlier achievements. After 1918, Josef Suk taught composition at the conservatory in Prague, gradually and voluntarily withdrawing from public sight. He eventually left the Czech capital for the provincial town of Benešov and composed only small piano pieces. Oskar Nedbal assumed the leadership of Bratislava's main theater, but proved unable to ensure its financial stability.