Dvorak Piano Concerto
Today I want to share with you Piano Concerto in G minor by Antonin Dvorak (1841-1904), a Czech composer. This is the only piano concerto Dvorak composed. According to Dvorak, in this concerto he was unable to create a battle between the piano and the orchestra. There is very little drama here; the piano is an important instrument, but it doesn’t put up a fight with the orchestra. But this concert is anything but a failure.
I implore you to start listening from the second movement (at the 18:27 mark). It had the same impact on me as the second movement of Shostakovich’s Piano Concerto No. 2. Both came to me through a random playlist created by Spotify, which I listen to while I read. However, when I heard the Shostakovich and Dvorak pieces, the music captivated me so much that I stopped. I’m not sure what words I should use to describe the piano solo in the second movement – clear, kind, gentle, romantic… but I’ll let you be the judge.
Vitaliy Katsenelson is the CEO at IMA, a value investing firm in Denver. He has written two books on investing, which were published by John Wiley & Sons and have been translated into eight languages. Soul in the Game: The Art of a Meaningful Life (Harriman House, 2022) is his first non-investing book. You can get unpublished bonus chapters by forwarding your purchase receipt to bonus@soulinthegame.net.
Loved Dvorak! I listened to this while I was writing my Substack. I never wrote before with music so wanted to see how it went. It was wonderful, It didn't interfere with my thought process, but actually slowed me down and I think I thought more clearly. I have a friend who married into the name Dvorak in Wisconsin. A long lost relative...maybe.