In 1871 Dvořák left the Provisional Theatre orchestra to have more time for composing. Up through 1871 Dvořák only gave opus numbers up to 5 among his first 26 compositions., B.1 through B.26, with Op. 1 assigned both to a string quintet B.7 and to the opera Alfred, B.16; see "Works" about irregular opus numbering The first press mention of Antonín Dvořák appeared in the Hudební listy journal in June 1871, and the first publicly performed composition was the song Vzpomínání ("Reminiscence", October 1871, musical evenings of L. Procházka).From a set, "Songs to words by Eliška Krásnohorská", B.23 in . The opera The King and the Charcoal Burner was returned to Dvořák from the Provisional Theatre and said to be unperformable. Its overture was premiered in 1872 in a Philharmonic concert conducted by Bedřich Smetana, but the full opera with the original score was performed once in 1929,, B.21. and not heard again until a concert performance in September 2019 at the Dvořák Prague International Music Festival. Clapham says Dvořák realized he had gone to "extremes in attempting to follow the example of Wagner". In 1873–74, he reset "the King and Charcoal Burner libretto entirely afresh, in a totally different manner", without using "anything from the ill-fated earlier version". The alternate opera, called King and Charcoal Burner II, B.42, was premiered in Prague in 1874.
