This video is dedicated with love and sincere gratitude to Daniel and his family, who introduced me to, and made me fall in love with, the Czech Republic and anything Czech, opening up a new world to me. For all their care and love, and for all they have enriched my life with, I thank them heartily. Vltava from Má Vlast by Bedřick Smetana, Prague Philharmonic Orchestra, Conductor: Libor Pesek. Some notes on the Vltava: Bedřick Smetana was born in Czechoslovakia in 1824 and died in 1884. Smetana is a heroic figure in Czech culture, and very often he is held in higher esteem, in the Czech Republic, than other, perhaps better known, composers such as Antonín Dvořák. Smetana is considered as the founder of a Czech national school of music. Indeed he was the first composer to write music using Czech folk tunes and dance rhythms. Smetana's music transmits a passionate Czech nationalism and patriotism. This patriotism is best expressed in Má Vlast, which Smetana began in 1872. The name of this set of six orchestral tone poems reflects the essence of nationalism: Má Vlast, generally rendered as My Country. Má Vlast is an exceptional composition made up of six orchestral tone poems. The second of these is the Vltava, which Smetana wrote in 1874. He was already going deaf at the time he started the first piece of Má Vlast. By the time Smetana wrote the Vltava, he had gone completely deaf. Ironically enough, Smetana wrote this extraordinary piece of descriptive music without hearing <b>...</b>