The inspiration for this rather spiky but lively and entertaining work was the set of three songs Dvořák wrote in January 1877 for male voice choir, of which the third (‘I’m a fiddler, poor as can be’) starts with a jaunty C major theme. But because the purpose of the concert was to raise money for the church in which it was being held, the first performance attracted almost no attention in the press, as a result of which Dvořák forgot about the piece until ten years later when he decided to put it into a concert in Prague and it was so well received that he sent it to Hans Richter who declared it was “a magnificent work” and promptly included it in one of his concerts in St James's Hall, London in May 1887. Dvořák also retrieved other compositions from his earlier years, and Simrock now published them all: Symphony No.5 op.76, Quintet in G op.77, and Quartet in E op.80.

sources

A  Autograph score (1877), in the Czech Museum of Music, Prague. A is not definitive; very many details of dynamics and articulation were revised later

E,P  First edition score and parts, published by Simrock in 1888

Ua  Urtext edition, published by Artia, Prague in 1957 The chief flaw of Ua, as in many of Artia's Dvořák editions, is that they failed to grant any validity to P, an independent authentic source deriving from lost manuscript parts. P's text is different from E's in many authentic respects

E,P have no bar numbers, but they are so useful (indeed, indispensable in the Finale) that their adoption is recommended.