# Underrated Geniuses: Dvorak and Vivaldi



## aioriacont (Jul 23, 2018)

These two geniuses are really, really underrated. Vivaldi especially receives some unfair mocking. Who else made something as amazing and conceptual at the time as the Four Seasons? However, he is not only Four Seasons. The entire "Il Cimento dell'Armonia I Invenzione", from which the seasons are a part of, rules, as well as his other big concertos' set such as La Cetra, Estro Armonico and his various violin sonatas. He has amazing Sacred Music, heavenly heights with his vocal sacred music, as well as his various operas that have a strong fire within them. And those who say all the concertos sound the same, have not listened to them well, and are just saying biased things.
Dvorak is a master of symphonies. Also, his symphonic poems are works of genius. His tone poems too. His sacred music features on of the most beautiful Requiem openings (my favorite actually), and his chamber music is so unfairly forgotten.
We need more careful listening to those two guys.


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## Allegro Con Brio (Jan 3, 2020)

Agreed with your assessment of both (though I’m a tad more lukewarm on Vivaldi than you) though I would not say either is underrated at all. However, Dvorak’s sacred music is undoubtedly underrated; I am in total agreement with you on his Requiem which just may be my favorite overall requiem alongside Faure and Durufle.


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## Bulldog (Nov 21, 2013)

I agree with you about Dvorak, especially the chamber works and sacred choral music. Concerning Vivaldi, he's one of the big three in late baroque music along with Bach and Handel - doesn't sound underrated to me. Personally, I listened to and bought a lot of his music for about 20 years, then decided it was a black hole I needed to delete from my inventory. So, I donated my Vivaldi recordings to the local library and my daughter. Later in life, I did listen to some of his vocal works; they didn't click either. Vivaldi and I are not on the same wavelength.


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## Neo Romanza (May 7, 2013)

I am head over hills in awe of Dvořák --- he’s my man (as Wagner said of Bruckner). I wouldn’t dispute the inventiveness of much of Vivaldi’s music. He’s one of the only Baroque composers I feel a certain kinship with (the other being Rameau), but I wouldn’t say he’s a ‘genius’, although I’d be hesitant to name someone as a genius to begin with. I’m trying to use this word more sparingly these days as, if you think about it, the world isn’t necessarily flooded with musical geniuses.


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## consuono (Mar 27, 2020)

I agree about Dvorak. On Vivaldi, I'd have to agree with Stravinsky's famous dig that goes something like "he didn't compose 500 concertos, he composed the same concerto 500 times". There is a formulaic sameness in Vivaldi's music, to me anyway.


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## SONNET CLV (May 31, 2014)

There's nothing quite like Vivaldi's A minor Concerto, Op. 3 No. 6, RV 356. Not even anything else by Vivaldi!






I wouldn't want to be without it and at least a large handful of other Vivaldi works.

Nor is there anything quite like Dvořák's Ninth Symphony, _From the New World_. It's one of those rare works that transcends the common definition of "symphonic music" or "symphony" by creating an entire universe of sound unique in its time and place. I wouldn't want to live life without access to this and a large handful of other Dvořák works.

Now … what again is the question for this thread?


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## aioriacont (Jul 23, 2018)

and this requiem, wow! Check this version, people


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## Neo Romanza (May 7, 2013)

aioriacont said:


> and this requiem, wow! Check this version, people


Or this:


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## consuono (Mar 27, 2020)

I think composers like Corelli, François Couperin and Rameau are far more unjustly "underrated" or neglected than Vivaldi.


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## Bulldog (Nov 21, 2013)

consuono said:


> I think composers like Corelli, François Couperin and Rameau are far more unjustly "underrated" or neglected than Vivaldi.


Add Louis Couperin to the list. He really gets the shaft when it comes to reputation and exposure.


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## kyjo (Jan 1, 2018)

I agree with you about Dvorak in the sense that the majority of his output, which contains so many gems, isn't given nearly as much exposure as a select few works of his (Symphonies 8 and 9, "American" Quartet, Slavonic Dances, Cello Concerto, "Dumky" Trio). It's a similar situation with, say, Saint-Saens. As for Vivaldi, I don't listen to his music often, but when I do, it gives me great pleasure. I don't think Stravinsky's accusation of his music is entirely fair. I will say, though, that there are countless composers who I think are overall more "underrated" than either - that is, composers that most of the average concert-going public haven't even heard of. At least most people have heard of Dvorak and Vivaldi!


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## accmacmusic (May 9, 2020)

I would not call either underrated, names like Galuppi, etc. come to mind instead.


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## Rogerx (Apr 27, 2018)

Underrated by whom?


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## DaddyGeorge (Mar 16, 2020)

n my country, until the Velvet Revolution in 1989, Smetana was strongly favored by the regime for political (national) reasons, so that after 1990 (at the time when I started with the classics) there was a complete Dvořák boom. So I don't feel that Dvořák is underrated (from my narrow point of view). In the 1990s, it may have been quite the opposite. Anyway, I love his music (especially Oratorios) and if it's globally underrated (not so often played and recorded), it's a pity.
As for Vivaldi, I completely agree. I also feel that he is perceived as somewhat less seriously than other great Baroque composers. I think his vocal music in particular is very underappreciated. And it's really a shame:


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## Oldhoosierdude (May 29, 2016)

Rogerx said:


> Underrated by whom?


Not sure.

Their mothers liked them.


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## Rogerx (Apr 27, 2018)

Oldhoosierdude said:


> Not sure.
> 
> Their mothers liked them.


I like to see that information in writhing by source.


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## larold (Jul 20, 2017)

I understand your enthusiasm but don't believe anyone thinks Dvorak and Vivaldi are underrated.

Generally speaking if you know of a composer s/he's not underrated.


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## Ethereality (Apr 6, 2019)

I disagree with the notion that the greatest composers can't be underrated. Almost every composer is either underrated or overrated according to someone. For instance, an advanced group of listeners, will point out that half of the composers out there are underrated, including Brahms and many already known greats. It wouldn't matter if someone considers that to be Beethoven: if Beethoven currently has 100,000(U)nits of public attention, then they would be implying that Beethoven deserves even more.

So if you think Dvorak and Vivaldi are the greatest composers, then you definitely think they're underrated. It goes without saying. Nothing wrong with that. 

We had a recent thread celebrating Dvorak as the forum's 9th favorite composer, according to all the work entry participants. Now you might think 9th place is simply not enough. His most famous work, New World Symphony, is currently in the 4th Tier: that's astounding. There are only 7 pieces above it.


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## Coach G (Apr 22, 2020)

I don't think that Dvorak or Vivaldi are underrated. Dvorak's _Symphony #9 "New World"_ and Vivaldi's _Four Seasons_ have been recorded probably over 100 times each by every major conductor and orchestra (sometimes revited more than once by the same conductor). Dvorak's _Cello Concerto_ is regarded as the best in the genre not-with-standing the wonderful cello concertos by Elgar and Shostakovich; and every concert cellist from Casals, to Rostropovich to Yo-Yo Ma have had their hand at it. Dvorak's chamber works and much else in Vivaldi's body of work has been recorded several times over, in Vivaldi's case in two layers HIP and un-HIP.

I will offer up two works by Dvorak and Vivaldi that I think are not very well known that are favorites of mine:

_Four Romantic Pieces_ for Violin and Piano by Dvorak: I have a recording on LP by Isaac Stern and Alexnder Zakin; yet to be released on CD, an excellent and very warm, and Romantic gem.

_Concerto for Three Violins_ by Vivaldi: I have Isaac Stern, Itzhak Perlman and Pinchas Zukerman on violins with Zubin Mehta and the NYPO. It's a tour de force where Stern, Perlman and Zukerman really kick it into turbo.


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## mbhaub (Dec 2, 2016)

Neither is underrated, but unappreciated I think. Personally, I don't care for Vivaldi, but I don't listen to baroque era music at all. But Dvorak: he's taken for granted. His music is so amiable, joyful, and easy to listen to that his real talent is too often ignored. The 8th symphony is a staggering achievement once you get past its surface attractions, which are many. Few symphonies have been so tightly integrated. The string quartets are magnificent creations, and I personally prefer them over any of the quartets of Mozart, Beethoven, Brahms and others. The Requiem is a great work, as is the Stabat Mater, but both are practically unknown outside of old Bohemia. I really like his operas. Rusalka is just beautiful. Fortunately, it gets presented regularly. The other operas aren't nearly as well known which is a real shame. As to his symphonic poems, some of them are excellent, but I don't think he was at his best in any of them. Some of them are really too long and pretty boring to play actually. A lot of note spinning. Did Dvorak write anything though that is really offensive? I doubt it. Now, if we could only convince conductors to program something besides symphonies 7, 8, 9, the violin and cello concerti, Carnival Overture and the Czech Suite or Slavonic Dances. There's so much else!


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## BlackAdderLXX (Apr 18, 2020)

They're not underrated by me! I love them both. Rumor has it their mothers were quite fond of them as well, but I can't cite any references to back that assertion. 

Perhaps the sighs and eyerolls one might get when mentioning Four Seasons or New World might cause one to think they are underappreciated, but again, not by me. I'd imagine their mothers either but again, I'm no expert.


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## Gallus (Feb 8, 2018)

Dvorak has 1.5 million monthly listeners on Spotify. Vivaldi has 2.8 million. 

Underrated is, like, Johannes Ockeghem (10,254 listeners), Chevalier de Saint-Georges (11,178) or Sofia Gubaidulina (5,421).


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## annaw (May 4, 2019)

Gallus said:


> *Dvorak has 1.5 million monthly listeners on Spotify. Vivaldi has 2.8 million. *
> 
> Underrated is, like, Johannes Ockeghem (10,254 listeners), Chevalier de Saint-Georges (11,178) or Sofia Gubaidulina (5,421).


I think this might be because both of them have at least one very widely used, played and much-listened piece - Dvorak has his 9th symphony and Vivaldi has _The Four Seasons_. It would be interesting to know what would be the number of monthly listeners if those two pieces were excluded. But I think it would still be more than of the composers you listed.


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## JAS (Mar 6, 2013)

Dvorak has always been a favorite for me, with lots of wonderful pieces. (Among the symphonies, I actually prefer the 6th to the 9th, but that may partly be due to over-familiarity.) Vivaldi is fine once you get over the fact that he was a genius at marketing a piece for various formats. (In an age before recordings, when people often made their own music, it was a matter of practicality to adapt a piece for assorted forces.)


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## Enthusiast (Mar 5, 2016)

If there is a problem with either of them it is that both produced quite a few works - including in forms that are usually reserved for major utterances - that are not top flight. For Dvorak this is because he developed his greatness slowly leaving many works that may not have been worthy of a opus number. The first two symphonies are examples. with Vivaldi, the problem is that he produced a lot of works on commission from the tourists of his time. Vivaldi is twice damned, however, but being incredibly popular so a lot of self-styled connoisseurs may find it difficult to enjoy his music with abandon. 

I do agree that both were greats but am not 100% sure that they are still denigrated. Dvorak/s reputation, anyway, seems not to suffer unduly from the "peasant composer" smears of seventy years ago.


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## Fabulin (Jun 10, 2019)

Gallus said:


> Dvorak has 1.5 million monthly listeners on Spotify. Vivaldi has 2.8 million.
> 
> Underrated is, like, Johannes Ockeghem (10,254 listeners), Chevalier de Saint-Georges (11,178) or Sofia Gubaidulina (5,421).


Where can such data be found?


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## hammeredklavier (Feb 18, 2018)

Gallus said:


> Dvorak has 1.5 million monthly listeners on Spotify. Vivaldi has 2.8 million.
> Underrated is, like, Johannes Ockeghem (10,254 listeners), Chevalier de Saint-Georges (11,178) or Sofia Gubaidulina (5,421).


These days, when I read comments like this, I ask myself questions like:
Is something "overrated" if it is just "popular"? What's the true definition of "overrated"? How "overrated" is Justin Bieber, compared to Zelenka (for example), as a musician?


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## wkasimer (Jun 5, 2017)

hammeredklavier said:


> How "overrated" is Justin Bieber, compared to Zelenka (for example), as a musician?











I think that says it all...


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## Ethereality (Apr 6, 2019)

hammeredklavier said:


> These days, when I read comments like this, I ask myself questions like:
> Is something "overrated" if it is just "popular"? What's the true definition of "overrated"? How "overrated" is Justin Bieber, compared to Zelenka (for example), as a musician?


I think if we want to try to objectively measure underratedness or overratedness, we would look at trends. That is because a trend shows how wrong or uninformed the public was, and how they're adjusting. Josquin for instance, is very underrated because he's trending upward at a fast rate since his discovery. Justin Bieber is the opposite, he started as very overrated and trending down very quickly. It has nothing to do with a composer being popular or not, because the measure is within the composer's own growth. Bach for instance used to be underrated and yet really popular. It's because his popularity was still to grow more.

But this is just a simple introductory way for me to explain it. The real way is not just about upward trends, but comparing how a composer is now, to the overall historical trend. A great musician will stand the test of time. Some music historian for example once gave many sources of Mozart being considered the very best by the composers after him. Let's just for an example assume that is true (in reality it's incomplete data, but let's assume it's true) then Mozart would be a bit underrated today, even though he's very popular. That's only because historically he might've been considered 'the best' but right now is not considered the best, but tied or surpassed. That's why I say a good equation for the 'best musicians of all time' would be √Time × avg popularity each year.

We don't have this data from history but we can start collecting it now. Year by year the pop musicians will fall out based on their "avg", the new pop musicians with high avg won't have enough "√Time", and we'll be left with the greatest objective musicians (ie. Classical composers.) If we measure popularity every year for 100 years, then we will have the golden objective list. 200 years, 300 years, etc. Even more fine-tuned.


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## annaw (May 4, 2019)

Ethereality said:


> I think if we want to try to objectively measure underratedness or overratedness, we would look at trends. That is because a trend shows how wrong or uninformed the public was, and how they're adjusting. Josquin for instance, is very underrated because he's trending upward at a fast rate since his discovery. Justin Bieber is the opposite, he started as very overrated and trending down very quickly. It has nothing to do with a composer being popular or not, because the measure is within the composer's own growth. Bach for instance used to be underrated and yet really popular. It's because his popularity was still to grow more.
> 
> But this is just a simple introductory way for me to explain it. The real way is not just about upward trends, but comparing how a composer is now, to the overall historical trend. A great musician will stand the test of time. Some music historian for example once gave many sources of Mozart being considered the very best by the composers after him. Let's just for an example assume that is true (in reality it's incomplete data, but let's assume it's true) then Mozart would be a bit underrated today, even though he's very popular. That's only because historically he might've been considered 'the best' but right now is not considered the best, but tied or surpassed. That's why I say a good equation for the 'best musicians of all time' would be √Time × avg popularity each year.
> 
> We don't have this data from history but we can start collecting it now. Year by year the pop musicians will fall out based on their "avg", the new pop musicians with high avg won't have enough "√Time", and we'll be left with the greatest objective musicians (ie. Classical composers.) If we measure popularity every year for 100 years, then we will have the golden objective list. 200 years, 300 years, etc. Even more fine-tuned.


Out of mere mathematical interest, why do you use square root? It should lessen the effect of time but is it somehow justified? Maybe I'm just not aware of some statistical model though. I think it could be somewhat difficult to develop a way to objectively evaluate popularity while also taking into account that the way music is listened to has changed drastically throughout time. Fascinating equation nevertheless!


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## tdc (Jan 17, 2011)

Two composers with a lot of good music. I prefer Vivaldi, and I think he was the more important composer of the two, his concerto form and melodic approach was quite influential on Bach. Therefore I see Vivaldi as highly rated and deservedly so. Dvorak has a lot of good music, but I'm not sure if he really impacted the course of music very much. In some ways I kind of see him as Brahms-lite, and have never really taken much interest in him. I see him as possibly slightly over rated however I acknowledge he was a very good composer with a gift for melody.


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## Enthusiast (Mar 5, 2016)

But then Dvorak was an early breakthrough for music that wasn't German or Italian ... and led the way for many others.


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## tdc (Jan 17, 2011)

Enthusiast said:


> But then Dvorak was an early breakthrough for music that wasn't German or Italian ... and led the way for many others.


Hmmm...But what about composers like Machaut, Dowland, Zelenka, Purcell, Rameau, Chopin etc. ?


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## Bulldog (Nov 21, 2013)

tdc said:


> Hmmm...But what about composers like Machaut, Dowland, Zelenka, Purcell, Rameau, Chopin etc. ?


Yes, let's listen to all of them and note their influence on subsequent composers. Well, all of them except for Vivaldi.


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## violadude (May 2, 2011)

I think Dvorak wrote some great gems that are underrated. His symphonic variations and tone poems like "The Water Goblin" are very good. I do think he took a while to find his footing though and so, kind of like Schubert, his early work is not nearly as good and tight as his later work. His 3rd string quartet is perhaps one of the most ill-proportioned pieces of music ever :O But he was good at learning from things like this.


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## kyjo (Jan 1, 2018)

mbhaub said:


> Neither is underrated, but unappreciated I think. Personally, I don't care for Vivaldi, but I don't listen to baroque era music at all. But Dvorak: he's taken for granted. His music is so amiable, joyful, and easy to listen to that his real talent is too often ignored. The 8th symphony is a staggering achievement once you get past its surface attractions, which are many. Few symphonies have been so tightly integrated. The string quartets are magnificent creations, and I personally prefer them over any of the quartets of Mozart, Beethoven, Brahms and others. The Requiem is a great work, as is the Stabat Mater, but both are practically unknown outside of old Bohemia. I really like his operas. Rusalka is just beautiful. Fortunately, it gets presented regularly. The other operas aren't nearly as well known which is a real shame. As to his symphonic poems, some of them are excellent, but I don't think he was at his best in any of them. Some of them are really too long and pretty boring to play actually. A lot of note spinning. Did Dvorak write anything though that is really offensive? I doubt it. Now, if we could only convince conductors to program something besides symphonies 7, 8, 9, the violin and cello concerti, Carnival Overture and the Czech Suite or Slavonic Dances. There's so much else!


I agree with pretty much all you say, though I hold Dvorak's tone poems in a bit higher esteem than you (the only one I'm not too fond of is _The Golden Spinning Wheel_). Sometimes, Dvorak gets dismissed as a "lightweight" composer, which I think is totally unfair. Some of his finest works (Cello Concerto, 7th Symphony, 3rd piano trio, 13th and 14th string quartets) contain a great amount of harmonic and rhythmic complexity (more so than most of his contemporaries, including - dare I say it - Brahms) that's often masked on the surface by his lovable melodic writing. His music is incredibly fun and rewarding to play as well as to listen to, and for this reason he's one of my very favorite composers.


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## Enthusiast (Mar 5, 2016)

tdc said:


> Hmmm...But what about composers like Machaut, Dowland, Zelenka, Purcell, Rameau, Chopin etc. ?


Most of those were a long time before Dvorak and the traditions they were part of had died. Chopin was Polish but was he a Polish national composer in the same way that Dvorak was a Czech national composer? Surely Dvorak (and yes probably one or two others) represented the first appearance of good and distinctive music that wasn't firmly situated in the Austro-German tradition for quite some time. I'm not saying he influenced those who came (though he probably did for some) or that he made possible what had been impossible ... merely that he was the first (or a very early) to break out with music that had a national flavour.


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