Chamber Music No. 1 , H 376, of 1959 is one of the last compositions by Bohuslav Martinů. It came into being six months before the composer’s death and it can be termed as his farewell to the world of Impressionism which had fascinated him for more than fifty years. In his letter to Miloš Šafránek, Martinů called it “a kind of nocturnal music” which corresponds with the originally intended name “Les Fêtes nocturnes” (Night Festivities) under which the work premiered.
In the spring of 1959 Martinů was fighting the onset of lung cancer and, being aware of the possibility of an early death, composed almost without a moment’s rest – simultaneously he worked on finalizing the second version of the opera Greek Passion, H 372 II, and the cantata Mikeš from the Hills, H 375, the last of four folk cantatas on Miloslav Bureš’s texts; in addition to this, he worked on Nonet No. 2, H 374. Of all the above-mentioned compositions, Chamber Music No. 1 (its title gives impression that Martinů clearly intended to produce another composition of a similar character, i.e. for similar instruments) is undeservingly the least known. In addition to the unusual combination of instruments, this was undoubtedly caused also by the fact that its printed score was published in France and that its publisher May Eschig does not promote it sufficiently.
Chamber Music No. 1 is mentioned for the first time in Martinů’s letter of March 4, 1959 to his family in Polička: “...the main thing is that I do not have to tire myself with visitors and see many people, so I sit at the piano and employ myself by composing. Mikeš will be finished soon. [...] Now I am writing another piece, for a sextet; the thing is we were invited to Braunschweig, which is somewhere in the upper part of Germany, to a festival in November and they want something new, they would like to perform one orchestral work and two chamber ones: the festival will take a whole week. We will meet other friends from Paris there, so it is certainly going to be nice.” The planned meeting with the French friends from the group École de Paris (Marcel Mihalovici, Tibor Harsányi, Conrad Beck) and others influenced without doubt the “French” character of Chamber Music No. 1; unfortunately it took place without Bohuslav Martinů, who had died three month prior to it.
Eva Benešová and Aleš Březina, concert programme Bohuslav Martinů Festival, 17 December 1997.