National Orchestra of Wales
Leader, Albert Voorsanger
Conducted by Warwick Braithwaite

The Bartered Bride, which is always considered to be Smetana's best Opera, is a comedy-in parts, indeed, more a Musical Comedy than an Opera. It is full of humorous incidents of Bohemian peasant life, and reproduces on the stage a village festival, gipsy jugglers, a comic village band and the like with, of course, some village love-making of a light-hearted sort. The three Dances we are to hear are a Polka, a Furiant (excited music, with strong stresses and bounding rhythms) and a Dance of Comedians.