Born into a humble family settled in Nelahozeves, a village near Prague, Antonín Dvořák left school at the age of 11 to learn his father's trades, butcher and innkeeper. Thankfully, Antonín's precocious musical gifts are quickly noticed, and the young boy is sent to study at his uncles's plance in Zlonice, then to Prague from 1857 onwards. Playing the viola in the Prager Kappelle's orchestra, Dvořák familiarized himself with the classical and contemporary masterworks. Enjoying a well-established reputation from his peers and the internation audience, Dvořák is in his lifetime a Major figure on the musical scene. Invited in Germanay, in France, in the United Kingdom and in the United States, Dvořák eventually went back to his homeland to manage the Conservatory of Pragua. Dvořák, who died in 1904, left a considerable oeuvre which has ever since been performed on the stages worldwide.
Composed in 1876, Dvořák's Piano concerto in G Minor is the composer's first attempt to appraoch this specific genre. Unlike most of the piano concertos in the classical repertoire, Dvořák's Concerto in G is not based upon a dramatical contrast between the soloist's instrument and the orchestra, but rather lies within a symphonic approach in which piano and orchestra go hand in hand in an joint movement. Premiered in 1878 by the pianist Karel Slavkovský, Dvořák's Piano concerto has been seldom performed. Thankfully, Igor Ardašev and the Prague Symphony Orchestra, under Petr Altrichter's baton, give the audience the chance to rediscover this piece full of Romantic fieriness.
