The honor of being the first symphonic poem writen by a Czech composer on a Czech subject falls to Zdenek Fibich's Zaboj, Slavoj and Ludek, Op. 37. Written in 1874, Fibich's Zaboj, Slavoj and Ludek was the first of a growing tide of nationalist tone poems by Czech composers that runs from this work through Smetana's Má Vlast (My Country) to Dvorák's late symphonic poems on Czech folk stories and the saber-rattling Taras Bulba. Based on an 1817 poem by Czech patriot Vaclav Hanka that purported to be a thirteenth century manuscript, Zaboj, Slavoj and Ludek tells the story of the heroic and successful defense of the Czech nation against the invading Germans, a story that had obvious parallels with the German-speaking Austrians' 500-year-long occupation of Fibich's Bohemia. Unfortunately, while Zaboj, Slavoj and Ludek is clearly a heartfelt work, it is also clearly the work of a well-trained and well-meaning composer whose ambition was greater than his abilities. Aside from being dominated by the striving theme for brass heard in the work's opening bars, Zaboj, Slavoj and Ludek is not an especially cohesive composition. Other themes appear and vanish, various episodes come and go, but the work is fundamentally discursive rather than thoroughly unifed. Nevertheless, Zaboj, Slavoj and Ludek is an effective work in context of the nationalist music of the second half of the nineteenth century. ~ James Leonard, All Music Guide
