Martinů’s three-act ballet with voices Špalíček dates from the middle of his years in Paris. The work has no overarching narrative; rather, it unfolds through a series of vignettes based on a series of “folk tales and Czech traditions”, as Martinů described it in a letter to the music publishers Schott on 13 February 1932. In the original version of the ballet, the episodes are relatively short in Acts 1 and 2, but Act 3 consists of just two longer pieces, The Legend of Saint Dorothea and The Spectre’s Bride. The start of the score of Špalíček is dated 20 January 1931, but it was more than a year later that Martinů began composing the closing section, The Spectre’s Bride, which is dated 30 January to 11 February 1932. The Spectre’s Bride is scored for soprano, tenor and bass soloists, women’s choir and orchestra. Erben’s ghoulish ballad telling the story of a young girl abducted by the ghost of her dead fiancé is simultaneously narrated by the voices and acted out by the dancers. The composer wrote about the origins of Špalíček at the time of the first performance in 1933. He writes that he first thought of composing The Legend of Saint Dorothea as early as 1924 but his ideas did not crystallise until seven years later. From the Legend he “proceeded to the ballet as a whole”. The first performance of Špalíček took place at the Prague National Theatre on 19 September 1933 under the baton of Jožka Charvát (choreography and direction by Joe Jenčík, scenic design by Josef Matěj Gottlieb). Around the beginning of 1940, Martinů seems to have decided that Špalíček needed revising. He confides in a letter sent to Miloš Šafránek on 15 February 1940 that he would like some of his theatre pieces to be played in the USA, suggesting that Špalíček might be his best bet, but observing that the ballet would have to be reworked into a more “integrated form”. Two of the most radical changes were the shortening of The Legend of Saint Dorothea and the removal altogether of The Spectre’s Bride. The revised version had to wait until several years after the War for its premiere, which was given at the Prague National Theatre on 2 April 1949 under the baton of Václav Kašlík.
Paul Wingfield, The Bohuslav Martinů Complete Edition: Field Mass, H 279, The Spectre’s Bride, H 214 I A, series VI/2/2, Prague: Bärenreiter, 2019.