String Quartet No. 1 (Smetana)
Composition for string quartet by Bedřich Smetana
String Quartet No. 1 ("From My Life", Czech: "Z mého života") in E minor, written in 1876, is a four-movement chamber composition by Czech composer Bedřich Smetana. It is an autobiographical work with nationalistic elements and was published in 1880 by František Augustin Urbánek in Prague. It was given a private premiere in 1878 in Prague, with Antonín Dvořák as violist, and its public premiere took place on 29 March 1879, performed by Ferdinand Lachner, Jan Pelikán, Josef Krehan and Alois Neruda. Smetana was a complex figure in his time, straddling his Austro-Hungarian upbringing coupled with his ethnic Czech background. His first quartet encompasses the politics and culture that resulted from that upbringing.
Background
Autobiography
At an unknown point in Smetana’s life, he contracted syphilis—in 1874, at 50 years old, his health began to swiftly decline. After a gradual decrease in his hearing, he became completely deaf by October of that year. It is widely believed that his deafness was caused by syphilis. After becoming deaf, Smetana moved in 1876 from Prague to Jabkenice.
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