Nationalism today is a destructive force. It's tearing apart Yugoslavia, splitting Czechoslovakia and threatening the stability of regions of the former Soviet Union.
But a century ago, nationalism exerted a more constructive influence, at least in the arts. Groups of European people unified by a common language or heritage were beginning to throw off the political and cultural domination of Germany and Austria.
They tried to emphasize the aspects of their culture that set them apart from the rulers of the big empires. If they couldn't have political autonomy, at least they could achieve artistic independence. Instead of brandishing guns, they armed themselves with potentially explosive homemade melodies and dances.
One composer who succeeded as both a nationalist and a cosmopolitan was Antonin Dvorák. Born to a poor family living near Prague, Dvorák became the leading Czech composer of the 19th century, equally adept at Germanic symphonies and Slavonic dances.
Dvorák was, strictly speaking, a native of Bohemia, the western nonSlovak part of what ultimately became Czechoslovakia. For centuries this region had been a pocketful of artistic treasures in the geopolitical overcoat of the Austrian empire.
Because they were subjects of a cosmopolitan empire, Bohemian composers were fully aware of musical currents elsewhere in Europe. But they also wanted to develop their own musical identity, not merely follow the lead of dominant Germanic composers like Beethoven and Brahms.
So, while the more isolated Russian composers like Glinka and Mussorgsky were pretty much starting from scratch and making up their own classical forms as they went along, the Czechs were thoroughly grounded in standard patterns of European classical music.
Instead of tossing together a lot of free-form symphonic poems inspired by folk tales and events in local history, the Czechs could set to work incorporating folk elements into their symphonies and string quartets. Dvorák did write his share of symphonic poems inspired by Czech poetry and legends, but these came late in his career.
He first attracted local attention in the 1860s and early '70s with a series of sunny symphonies and chamber works pretty much in the ``international'' - that is, Germanic style of the times. His first opera, in fact, used a text in German, not his own language.
Then, in 1878, he found a publisher for a set of eight Slavonic Dances. These are the most obviously nationalistic pieces Dvorák ever wrote, because they draw from his country's folk melodies and dance rhythms.
Dvoràk then began to use local song and dance forms in many of his trios, quartets and symphonies. One form he especially favored was the furiant, an exhilarating dance in 3/4 time with the accent constantly shifting to a different beat.
Another was the dumka, a ballad form that actually originated in the Ukraine. The dumka usually opens in an extremely melancholic mood, then suddenly bursts with gaiety. Dvorsák wrote a trio for violin, cello and piano in which each of the six movements is a dumka. The trio, published as his opus 90, is nicknamed ``Dumky'' - the plural of dumka.
However fresh his music may be, Dvorák might have turned out to be little more than a footnote in music history texts if he'd relied on nationalism alone. That's what happened to Russia's Dargomizhsky, Poland's Moniuszko and the Netherlands' Diepenbrock.
Beethoven and Brahms are regarded as ``universal'' composers, because their music is abstract and supposedly appeals to everyone. Moniuszko's appeals mainly to people who understand Polish folk music or speak Polish well enough to understand operas in that language.
Dvorák, like Norway's Edvard Grieg and Russia's Nikolai Rimsky-Korsakov, was an eclectic composer who employed certain techniques of the ``universalists.'' He became a worldwide favorite by using nationalism as only one ingredient in a musical pie held together in a light crust imported from Germany.
Strip away Dvorák's nationalist dress, and what you find is a naked Brahms. The two composers used a similar harmonic language, and were highly skilled proponents of classical form. Their symphonies and chamber works are excellent examples of how to put together movements using the same patterns, slightly enlarged, pioneered in the late 18th century by Mozart and Haydn.
Consider the way nationalism and internationalism work together in the last four of Dvorák's nine symphonies.
The seventh symphony is the most tragic and the most ``Germanic,'' in the abstract style of Brahms. Only in the third movement does Dvorák incorporate a dance rhythm from his homeland, as he had in the third movements of his fifth and sixth symphonies. This is where Beethoven placed his hyperactive scherzos.
Dvorák preferred something more specifically Czech, along the lines of a furiant.
The sixth and eighth are the most relaxed and folklike of Dvorsik's symphonies. Throughout both scores, the composer incorporates dance rhythms and song styles (but not actual song melodies) into the standard German classical patterns - sonata form, variation, rondo.
Dvorák wrote his ninth and last symphony in 1893 during his brief tenure as director of a New York music conservatory. He called it ``From the New World,'' and offered it as a model to American composers. This, he said, is how they could adapt the indigenous music of their land to symphonic form. It's a broad, dramatic work that incorporates a few spirituals and a Native American rhythm or two.
But American composers were slow to follow Dvorák's example. A few men formed an informal group known as the ``Indianist School,'' using or imitating tribal rhythms and melodies. But this dance around the fire produced no life-giving rain, and not until the 1920s did nationalism become much of a force in American music.
And then it was a decidedly Caucasian nationalism. First, American composers developed an interest in jazz, an acceptably commercialized form of black music that had been infiltrated by white musicians. Aaron Copland and George Gershwin - both of them white - led the way in translating jazz into classical forms, although they had plenty of competition from French and German composers.
Then, toward the 1940s, Copland turned his attention to Appalachian and Western folk music, and that became the dominant ``Americana'' sound of this country's classical music. So much for Dvorsik's emphasis on blacks and Indians. Nationalism, as the survivors of the Yugoslav civil war know, is a matter of deciding who you claim as your own folk.
Dvorák listening suggestions
Nationalism needn't count for much in performances of Dvorák's music. In the symphonies, of which everyone should know the last three, one of the best recorded cycles is by Czech forces - Vaclav Neumann and the Czech Philharmonic on Supraphon.
But equally fine are the Philips set with Polish conductor Witold Rowicki, the London set with Hungarian conductor Istvsin Kertesz, and the Chandos set with Estonian conductor Neeme Jarvi. All three of these use British orchestras.
Among Dvorák's chamber works, the most popular are the ``Dumky'' Trio and the ``American'' Quartet. For the trio, try the recording by the Suk Trio on Supraphon or that by Yo-Yo Ma, Emanuel Ax and Young Lick Him on CBS. The quartet has been done well by all the world's leading string ensembles, but Czechoslovakia's Smetana Quartet on Supraphon has a slight idiomatic edge.
The late cello concerto is another splendid Dvorrik work. Here, finding a good recording is largely a matter of picking your favorite cellist. But don't overlook the little known Angelica May on Supraphon.
And for the delectable Slavonic Dances in their orchestral versions, consider Neumann on Supraphon, Jarvi on Chandos or George Szell on CBS.