4. Chamber Music Concert

Jan Dismas Zelenka Trio sonata in F major ZWV 181 No. 5
Ludwig van Beethoven Cello sonata in G minor Op. 5 No. 2
Johann Friedrich Fasch Sonata for two oboes and two bassoons, FaWV N:F1
Leoš Janáček Pohádka for violoncello and piano
Bohuslav Martinů Sextet for wind instruments and piano H 174

This chamber music concert spans a wide range from the Baroque to Viennese Classicism and Czech Modernism. Jan Dismas Zelenka and Johann Friedrich Fasch were contemporaries of Johann Sebastian Bach. Zelenka came from Bohemia and worked at the Saxon court in Dresden, while Fasch, from Thuringia, worked briefly in Prague. Ludwig van Beethoven composed his Cello sonata in G minor in Berlin and dedicated it to King Frederick William II of Prussia. The last two works on the program take us back to the Czech Republic. Leoš Janáček’s Pohádka tells the Russian fairy tale of Tsarevich Ivan and Princess Marya in a rhapsodic tone. Bohuslav Martinů initially studied in Prague and moved to Paris in 1923. There he absorbed various musical influences: the esprit of the Groupe des Six, the formal rigor of Igor Stravinsky and the nonchalance of jazz.