Bedrich Smetana was the founder of the school of Czech musical nationalism. He was born in 1824 in Bohemia, of German-speaking parents. He studied music in Prague, and became a teacher and concert pianist. He became a fervent Nationalist, campaigning for independence from the Austro-Hungarian Empire. In 1856 he moved to Sweden for 5 years. When back in Prague he turned to Opera, and The Bartered Bride is his most well-known. 

He wrote the cycle of Symphonic Poems Ma Vlast (My Fatherland) between 1872 and 1879.   One of these, Vltava (Die Moldau in German) is a portrait of the river that flows through Prague, and this is the most well known of his tone-poems.