Antonín Dvořák conducted the premiere of his Nocturne in B major for string orchestra, Op. 40 (B 47), during his first tour of Great Britain in 1884. The trip was a great success – audiences cheered and critics heaped praise on a figure whose fame grew with each passing event. The highlight was Dvořák conducting his Stabat Mater at the Royal Albert Hall, where over one thousand performers assembled to give a monumental account of the ten-movement work. By contrast, the Nocturne occupies more modest proportions, lasting around seven minutes in performance, but was also favourably received, this time at the Crystal Palace on 22 March 1884, nine days after that triumphant Stabat Mater performance.

The genesis of the Nocturne begins somewhat earlier in Dvořák's career. Its opening section – featuring a long pedal on the dominant scale degree – is largely drawn from the slow movement of the String Quartet No. 4 in E minor (B 19). This experimental work was composed in around 1870 when Dvořák's musical language was in a relatively early stage of development. The work demonstrates the influence of Wagner expressed through chromaticism and exploration of the idea of endless melody, and perhaps something of Beethoven too, in its more general character of unconventionality and surprise, in dialogue with supposed norms of a genre. The slow movement – marked ‘Andante religioso’ – begins with an even longer pedal note of 52 bars than that found in the final Nocturne (which lasts 24 bars, from bars 5–28). And where the Nocturne's bass line eventually resolves onto the tonic, the earlier quartet has the cello perform wild passagework for the five bars in which it is not holding the pedal, leading directly into the subsequent movement in a new key area.

Dvořák later reworked the opening of this movement to form the second movement of his String Quintet in G major (B 49) which was completed in 1875. At this stage a resolution of the pedal to the tonic was introduced, and the opening reworked in a shorter version. The movement, designated ‘(Intermezzo) / II. Andante religioso / Nocturno’, was on the way to its final version. The quintet was performed as a five-movement work, including the Intermezzo, in 1879 before Dvořák detached it to create the four-movement score published in 1888. Meanwhile the deleted movement was refashioned as a work for string orchestra simply titled ‘Nocturno’ and performed in January 1883 in Prague. At this stage it may well have been in a version close to the final score. Then the saga of the Nocturne reached its final stages as it was prepared for publication in the autumn of that year, before the Crystal Palace performance the following spring.

This rather labyrinthine genesis is fully described in David R. Beveridge's Preface to the score, which is helpfully provided in English, German and Czech versions. The account is well supported by extensive footnotes. The editor's critical report is found at the back of the score, comprising descriptions of each of the sources, a short narrative on the editorial approach, and a commentary on individual issues encountered.

The key piece of new primary evidence informing this revised Urtext edition is a second authorized manuscript copy of the score with extensive autograph additions. As the critical report notes, previous editors had speculated about its existence; and its discovery, in the collection of a private owner, enables the present publication to present a more reliable musical text. As editor, Jonáš Hájek draws upon this new item while also consulting an autograph of the original quintet movement, the previously known authorized manuscript copy (which effectively converts the quintet movement into a Nocturne for string orchestra), and the published score and parts. In addition, the arrangement for violin and piano was studied, in both its manuscript and published versions.

Analysis of these sources reveals the importance of the previously unlocated second copy – it contains manuscript amendments that are absent from the first copy and therefore represents a key stage in the compositional process. Regrettably, the second copyist introduced numerous errors which Dvořák was often, but not always, able to correct. These include missing dynamic marks and slurs, unclear accidentals, and poor alignment between the parts in full score. The editor also detects evidence of corrections to the printing plates in the copies of the final published score he consulted, further suggesting Dvořák's active participation during the process of publication. The printed score is therefore the primary source for this revised Urtext, with amendments drawn from the full range of sources consulted as appropriate.

In performance, the most noticeable textual issue concerns the placing of pizzicato markings in the double bass part in the work's coda. This new edition brings the final pizzicato forwards by almost three bars, lending a quite different timbre to an exposed descending bass line below a held chord in the other parts. Interestingly, the work has been recorded a number of times with this passage played pizzicato. This approach was taken by Neville Marriner (Academy of St Martin-in-the-fields, HMV ASD 3943), for example. Others performed the passage arco with detached articulation, including Jiří Bělohlávek (Czech Philharmonic Orchestra, Chandos 9391), while Antal Doráti (Detroit Symphony Orchestra, Decca SXDL 7522) adopted silky smooth legato phrasing. This new edition therefore provides clarity on a point that conductors have previously tackled in a variety of different ways.

The textual matter exceeds the length of the full score itself, whose 51 bars cover just five pages. Its two halves form a curious pairing. The first with its previously noted Wagnerian influence recalls Dvořák's youth. Beveridge connects it convincingly with a passage on the same pedal note of F# in Die Meistersinger. Yet in the context of that lengthy opera, such a passage is a detail within a large and complex tonal argument – a brief tonal deviation far from the referential point of C major so famously proclaimed at the opera's opening and close. In the Nocturne's smaller frame, the pedal's positioning has more fundamental structural implications as it persists until more than halfway through the score. Throughout this passage dominant harmony is touched upon lightly; the absence of harmonic direction and polyphonic meandering melodic lines in conjunction with the title evoke a mystical scene from nature (a reviewer of the first performance referred to the ‘soft greys and greens’ of a Whistler painting).Footnote ¹

One also wonders if Dvořák turned to the nocturnes of John Field, in particular No. 11 in E-flat major, H 56. Here, Field emphasizes the dominant scale degree through melodic repetition, and in an offbeat pedal during the opening 34 bars, before a decisive affirmation of the tonic at bar 38. Neither Field nor Dvořák prolong the dominant chord consistently in these passages, as the tonic chord is heard on multiple occasions, but the fifth degree nonetheless remains prominent.

The second half of Dvořák's nocturne contrasts with the preceding pedal, setting off in a manner that is harmonically conventional; a four-bar phrase in the bass is performed without alteration three times, before a two-bar modified version leads to a nine-bar coda rooted in the tonic chord. Above this a single melodic idea is articulated and reworked, lending the passage a single focal point. Local chromaticism serves to affirm tonal direction, while no fewer than five ritartandos emphasize returns of the tonic chord. Through his handling of phrase structure, harmony and tempo Dvořák induces a sense of gentle swaying about a fixed point rather than a journey to a destination, in keeping with the generic designation. Both halves of the work invite association with the Nocturne genre in contrasting manners, in a divergence which lends the work an enigmatic character.

The process of transformation from the early quartet ‘Andante religioso’, through the string quintet ‘Intermezzo’, to a ‘Nocturne’ for strings suggest a movement away from religious towards secular concerns. It is interesting, therefore, to note two points of contact between the work and the opening movement of the Stabat Mater. This ‘Andante con moto’ in B minor (rather than B major) also begins with a 15-bar pedal on the dominant scale degree, and the bass line of its coda features a three-note descending figure from the first to the sixth to the fifth degree that echoes the Nocturne's closing bars. Such comparisons show Dvořák shaping and reshaping musical ideas in works of varying scale and design, integrating musical influences such as Wagner in the development of his own distinctive musical voice.

This new Urtext is a most welcome addition to Bärenreiter's expanding catalogue of revised Dvořák scores. Once again, these endeavours ensure that scholars and performers have access to the most reliable musical text possible, informed by the latest scholarly developments.