THE CZECH COMPOSER WHO INVENTED AMERICAN MUSIC
Antonin Dvořák, whose 170th anniversary is this year, was not just the greatest of Czech composers. You could argue that Dvořák (1841-1904), the son of a butcher from a village near Prague, was also the father of American classical music. Just as he urged his compatriots to incorporate Czech folk tunes and even birdsong into their music, he urged American composers to use their own songs for inspiration – so much so that he horrified several milli
