This article was downloaded by: [University of Strathclyde]

On: 23 October 2014, At: 04:03

Publisher: Routledge
Informa Ltd Registered in England and Wales Registered Number: 1072954 Registered office: Mortimer House,
37-41 Mortimer Street, London W1T 3JH, UK

Nationalities Papers: The Journal of Nationalism and

Ethnicity
Publication details, including instructions for authors and subscription information:
http://www.tandfonline.com/loi/cnap20

From generation to generation the spirit seeks the way:

Slovene musical Creativity in the past and today
a
Lojze Lebič
a
Professor of Musicology , Ljubljana University
Published online: 19 Oct 2007.

To cite this article: Lojze Lebič (1993) From generation to generation the spirit seeks the way: Slovene musical
Creativity in the past and today, Nationalities Papers: The Journal of Nationalism and Ethnicity, 21:1, 145-155, DOI:
10.1080/00905999308408264

To link to this article: http://dx.doi.org/10.1080/00905999308408264

PLEASE SCROLL DOWN FOR ARTICLE

Taylor & Francis makes every effort to ensure the accuracy of all the information (the “Content”) contained
in the publications on our platform. However, Taylor & Francis, our agents, and our licensors make no
representations or warranties whatsoever as to the accuracy, completeness, or suitability for any purpose of the
Content. Any opinions and views expressed in this publication are the opinions and views of the authors, and
are not the views of or endorsed by Taylor & Francis. The accuracy of the Content should not be relied upon and
should be independently verified with primary sources of information. Taylor and Francis shall not be liable for
any losses, actions, claims, proceedings, demands, costs, expenses, damages, and other liabilities whatsoever
or howsoever caused arising directly or indirectly in connection with, in relation to or arising out of the use of
the Content.

This article may be used for research, teaching, and private study purposes. Any substantial or systematic
reproduction, redistribution, reselling, loan, sub-licensing, systematic supply, or distribution in any
form to anyone is expressly forbidden. Terms & Conditions of access and use can be found at http://
www.tandfonline.com/page/terms-and-conditions
 Nationalities Papers, Volume XXI, Number 1, Spring 1993

FROM GENERATION TO GENERATION THE SPIRIT

SEEKS THE WAY:
Slovene Musical Creativity in the Past and Today*
Downloaded by [University of Strathclyde] at 04:03 23 October 2014

Lojze Lebič

Time present and time past

Are both perhaps present in time future,
And time future contained in time past.
(T. S. Eliot, Four Quartets)

The early strains of Slovene music resound with the echoes of Dlyrians and
Celts, peoples who once travelled across present-day Slovene territory, now
peopled by Slovenes who remained here as the most westemly settled branch
of Slavs.
The space—the territory—upon which a nation evolves is its destiny.
The windy, open world of today's Slovenia is a fertile land that welcomed
and blended components of various national origins. Situated at the
crossroads of numerous routes—from the east through the Ljubljana-
Postojna gateway towards Italy, and from the north along the primeval
amber road towards the Adriatic—the Slovenes are sandwiched between
strong Germanic and Roman cultural hinterlands, and, to the east, the ever
restless historical boundaries where the Christian Roman world meets with
Greek Orthodoxy and Islam.
From the very beginning, Slovenes have been naturally, culturally,
religiously and politically linked to Europe. The Central European vision of
culture is perhaps the most discernable in Slovenes in their music. Although
on the geographic periphery, or perhaps for this very reason, Slovenes have
always been sensitive to European values and standards when these were
endangered. During the long centuries of political subordination, culture and
art have become synonyms for freedom and resistance, from which a
flourishing and rich musical culture has grown.

145
 Nationalities Papers

Domination of the land has passed through many hands; Germans,

Hungarians, Turks, Austrians came and left. But the people who remained,
spoke Slovene; not merely the ordinary people, but also knights and poets,
such as UMch von lichtenstein and Oswald von Wolkenstein who spoke and
sang in Slovene in the thirteenth and fourteenth centuries.
The beginning of Slovene music dates back to the first cries of "Kyrie
Eleison," which intermingled with Slovene folk songs. Christianization
spread from Italy by way of Aquileia, as did later Renaissance music, which
resounded in the churches and monasteries of Ljubljana diocese, established
in the fifteenth century. This music has been preserved in numerous
manuscripts written in Slovenia or in psalters and hymnaries brought from
Downloaded by [University of Strathclyde] at 04:03 23 October 2014

elsewhere (e.g., the wonderful Carniolan Missal from 1491).

The Tridentine Counter-Reformists also came from Italy. In Ljubljana's
Jesuit College they strengthened European customs and laid the foundations
for later colleges (1619). From Italy also came the first operas and the
model for the humanistic musical association, Academia Philoharmonicorum
Labacensis (1701).
Cultural incentives of equal importance came from the northwest.
Salzburg contributed, first of all, Catholicism and the feudal system. This
was followed in the sixteenth century by Protestantism, which inspired
Primoz Trubar to write the first book in the Slovene language (1550) as well
as the first Slovene song-book. A language was thus established, and, since
then, has served as a vehicle of Slovene national conscience.
These were dangerous and difficult times, characterized by Turkish
invasions, suppressive feudal laws and peasant uprisings against their
overlords. The music resounding in cathedrals and monasteries across
Slovenia was European but too restrictive. Many talented composers were
forced to go abroad—a long line of Carnolius-es1, including the most
famous, Jacobus Gallus Camiolus (born in Carniola in 1550, died in Prague
in 1591). With his books Opus Musicum and secular collections Harmoniae
Morales and Moralia, Gallus has become the undisputed third peak between
Orlando di Lassus and Palestrina.
If the Academia Philharmonicorum Labacensis was a child of the
baroque, the creation of the Philharmonic Society (Philharmonische
Gesellschaft, 1794), established in Ljubljana in the second half of the
seventeenth century as the first of its kind to serve the Habsburg monarchy,
can be attributed to more northern initiatives. This society was established
even before the Gesellschaft fiir Musikfreunde in Vienna, the Musikverein in
Graz, the Dommusikverein in the Mozarteum in Salzburg and the Societd
Filarmonicodrammatica in Trieste.

146
 LebiC: Slovene Music

The young Franz Schubert's application for a job as music teacher in

Ljubljana (on the recommendation of Salieri) at the beginning of the
nineteenth century is perhaps the best illustration of the openness of musical
life in the capital of Slovenia during this period. The honorable members of
the Ljubljana Philharmonic Society were, among others, Beethoven and
Paganini, and later, Brahms and Dvof<Lk as well as Gustav Mahler who
began his career in Ljubljana as a conductor and pianist (1881-1882).
However, the intentions of our northern neighbors to Germanize
Slovenia became increasingly evident from the seventeenth century onwards.
The ideal of enlightenment and national awakening began its victorious
march among Slovenes and, by the middle of the nineteenth century, in the
Downloaded by [University of Strathclyde] at 04:03 23 October 2014

spring of nationhood, it grew into a clearly expressed national movement.

Gathered around the poetic genius of France PreSeren and a program for a
United Slovenia, the Slovenes were reborn as a nation. Musical art,
traditionally above a national level and parallel to or within European
parameters, needed new foundations. Alongside the existing music
institutions of traditionally non-Slovene orientation, the Slovenes established
an all-Slovene Music Society (1872) as a school which developed into the
nucleus of the later conservatory. The choir was later joined by the Slovene
Philharmonic (1908), a concert agency and the Musical Ethnographic
Institute (1934). Following the example of the Ljubljana Music Society,
similar societies were established in Gorizia, Trieste, Maribor, Celje and
elsewhere. The beginning of Slovene opera also dates from this period.
And what of creativity? The sole thread of unbroken tradition enabling
composers to create new Slovene music was folk art and folk song. Without
it, Slovene culture would have withered. Composers have returned to this
tradition again and again. They turned to the sources collected by Karel
Strekelj in his extensive books entitled Slovene Folk Songs, which he began
to publish in 1895. All the works of composers—Gorenjski slavdek ("The
Nightingale of Upper Camiola"), a witty, musical comedy-opera by Anton
Foerster (1837-1926), the charming Serenada ("Serenade For Strings") by
Benjamin Ipavec (1829-1908), as well as solos and the first Slovene
romantic Lovska simfonija (Hunting Symphony) by Fran Gerbic (1840-
1917)—are paraphrases of folk songs, a patriotic journey into folk art.
The period that followed is marked by three consecutive generations of
talented composers and represents an incredibly rapid maturing of Slovene
music. The first were the Tradionalists: Risto Savin (1859-1948) with the
opera Matija Gubec, Emil AdamiC (1877-1936) with the choirs and
orchestral suites Tatarska suita ('Tartar Suite"), Iz ntoje mladosti ("From My
Youth"), Ljubljana akvareli ("Ljubljana Aquarelles"), and Anton Lajovic

147
 Nationalities Papers

(1878-1960) with solos and symphony movements such as Caprice Pesem

jeseni ("Song of Autumn"), were no longer dilettantish patriots, but
musicians educated in a world of fin de siecle atmosphere. Faced with the
task of filling an inherited emptiness and isolated from more dynamic music
centers, they were compelled to remain moderate. These feelings were
strong in the period following the First World War, when, after the collapse
of the Austro-Hungarian Empire, Slovenes joined the "first" Yugoslavia in
the hope that life would be easier among their southern brothers, (though
they soon found themselves in a new prison of nations, now under the
Karadjordjevich dynasty).
The position of the composers Savin, Adamic, Lajovic, Ravnik
Downloaded by [University of Strathclyde] at 04:03 23 October 2014

Keradjordjevich and others gathered around the musical magazine New

Chords, was similar to that of Sibelius in Finland, Nielsen in Denmark and
de Falla in Spain, who expressed the national idiom of their landscapes in a
period when the pastoral style of life was disappearing. Fragments of folk
music could still be found, but these were becoming more and more
concealed by the colorful elements of late romanticism and impressionism.
The Late Romantic Modernists were the second wave of composers
appearing in the twenties. Marij Kogoj (1892-1956), a "Viennese student of
Schreker and Schonberg, was a romantic in his perception of artistic beauty,
and an expressionist in his striving for artistic truth. His opera Crne maske
("Black Masks") is a moving, scenic poem about man's existential distress
and conflicting emotions. Its compositional technique and expressiveness
are on the level of such masterpieces as Strauss's Electra, SchOnberg's
monodramas Erwartung or Die gluckliche Hand and Berg's Wozzeck.
Linear Modern is represented by a third wave of musicians appearing in
the thirties. The leading figure was Slavko Osterc (1895-1941), a student of
Hab who had studied in Prague. His Suite for Orchestra and Four Gradnik
Poems for Contralto and String Quartet are the basic works of contemporary
Slovene creativity. Although his breadth cannot be compared to Kogoj's
profound publicistic and compositorial expressiveness, Osterc's enrapturing
personality, teaching agility, cultural and political maturity and international
orientation (through the Yugoslav section of SIMQ so firmly established the
Slovene Modern that neither war nor post-war spiritual repression could
suppress its subversive existence. (The ideas of Kogoj and Osterc became
the sustenance of an opposition of young creative composers who formed the
ProMusica Viva group in the sixties).
The four great masters of the first half of the twentieth century—Emil
AdamiC, Anton Lajovic, Marij Kogoj and Slavko Osterc—demonstrated
their sovereign mastery in returning Slovene music to contemporary

148
 LebiC: Slovene Music

European trends and thus incorporated Europeanism into Slovene existence.

The first two continued to realize the romantic dreams of Slovene music,
while Kogoj (as the initiator in the twenties) and Osterc (as his follower in
the thirties) reevaluated music as an autonomous, personal and expressive
art. Their musical doctrine was adopted by younger composers such as
Matija BravniCar and SreCko Koporc (Kogoj's followers), as well as by
many students of Osterc, including Karol Pahor, Pavel Sivic, Marjan
LipovSek, Demetrij 2ebre, and Primo2 RamovS.
But behind this stimulating growth the grey skies of Picasso's Guernica
could already be foreseen. Composers undertook the role of social catalysts:
Matija BravniCar (1897-1977) with his opera of the masses Hlapec Jernej in
Downloaded by [University of Strathclyde] at 04:03 23 October 2014

njegova pravica ("Bailiff Jernej and His Rights"), Karol Pahor (1896-1974)
with the extensive chorus OCenaS Hlapca Jerneja ("The Our Father of
Bailiff Jernej")—based on Cankar's short story—Marjan Kozina (1907-
1966) with the opera Ekvinokcij ("Equinox") and Danilo Svara (1902-1981)
with Vision, a cantata for soloists, choir and orchestra. Naturally, the
majority of Slovene musicians decided to take an active part in the rebellion
against occupation in 1941. Music moved to partisan circles and Home
Guard detachments; it began to spread by means of illegally printed song-
books and the illegal radio of the Liberation Front In their desire for power,
the Communists made use of clever provocations to drive their ideological
opponents into collaboration, designating them as "quislings," thereby
bringing on the bloodshed of civil war in Slovene rebellion and heroism. In
spite of this, the majority of Slovene musicians accepted the liberation
struggle as a national and civil one. Therefore, this period also deserves
respectful remembrance for its musical life as expressed by Marjan Kozina,
Karol Pahor, Franci Sturm, Pavel Sivic, Bojan AdamiC, Karel Rupel, Marko
Bajuk and others on both sides of the struggle.
The harvest of war and death cut deep wounds into Slovene musical life.
Emil Adamic" and Slavko Osterc died before the war, Marij Kogoj had long
been absent because of mental illness and Anton Lajovic could no longer be
heard. Although there was a great deal of enthusiasm, marches and poems
for special occasions (whose wording was often changed by order of the
Communist Party), liquidations went on behind the scenes (so secretive that
only after more than forty years were candles allowed to be lit in places
where mass liquidation had taken place). A Kafkaesque drama in the
shadow of an illusive normality.
Everything was subordinated to the building of a "new world"; the
progressive musical and aesthetic trends of the prewar period—a late
romantic modernism and modern linearity, as well as their adherents—were

149
 Nationalities Papers

rejected. Out of hostility towards the past, the "bourgeois" Musical Society
was closed and a general disrespect for tradition prevailed. The Catholic
Church with all its musical institutions was pushed into modem catacombs.
The new professional societies were merely tools of the Communist Party.
Art was forced to participate in the socialistic transformation of society
into an imaginary structure of working people lacking a distinguishable
musical taste.
Slovenia was once again a political captive, this time in a communist,
centralized Yugoslavia behind the iron curtain. Cultural ties with the world
were severed. Musicians either escaped, withdrew to internal emigration, or
conformed. It would be unjust to claim that Slovene Communists—despite
Downloaded by [University of Strathclyde] at 04:03 23 October 2014

the international debt—were not prepared to build postwar Slovene music on

the works of domestic composers. But not much had existed in the past to
suit their tastes. Gallus and others from the baroque period were too
ecclesiastical, the Slovene romantics, AdamiC and Lajovic, were too
bourgeois, while Kogoj, Osterc and their students were too modemistically
subjective. Thus, the predominant figures at concerts during the first
postwar years were classic world composers as well as Soviet composers and
their social-realistic adherents from Eastern Europe. The principal domestic
works were those inspired by personal war experiences. Among these were
such important creations as Goxdovi pojejo ("The Woods Are Singing") by
Bla2 Arnic (1901-1970) and Simfonija ("Symphony") by Marjan Kozina.
Although symphonic conceptions are an ideal medium for expressing the
immense richness of human feelings, the composers, rather than comply
with the demands of socialist mood, withdrew to orchestra and concert
music: Marjan LipovSek (1910) with a swift Second and Third Suite for
Strings, PrimoZ RamovS (1912) and UroS Krek (1922) with two merry,
masterly composed Symphonettes for Orchestra, Dane Skerl (1931) with a
Serenade for Strings.
The most influential and key figure of the postwar period was the
romantic Lucijan Marija Skerjanc (1900-1973), a personage of unlimited
curiosity, but a doctrinaire musician. Unfortunately, he had no equally
influential counterpart from the circle of expressionists (Kogoj) or
neoclassicists (Osterc). Consequently, the works of "decadent modernism,"
namely, those of Bartdk, Stravinsky, SchOnberg, Varese or Messiaen,
remained inaccessible to Slovenes. This did not change even after the
dispute with the Soviet Union (1948) when the "revolutionary conscience"
began to fade and, at least on the surface, the Communist Party began to
abandon the musical scene, no longer considering music a political threat
From this time onward, the authorities attempted to fill the resulting

150
 Lebid: Slovene Music

ideological void with more and more "easy listening" music; Jazz and
popular music were allowed, but the most favored was the alpine version
of popular folk music. On the other hand, the field of serious music
was supervised through premeditated staff replacements (radio, schools,
program councils).
However, historical memory and loyalty to western thought could not be
suppressed. Among the first to reject collecu'vistic vitalism were the poets, (
Pesmi Stirih 1954), followed by artists with exhibitions of surrealists, and
musicians characterized by intimacy, idylls and personal sentimentality. The
choreographic poem Obrefje plesalk ("The Coast of the Dancers") by
Zvonimir CigliC (1921) dates from this period, which is also reflected in
Downloaded by [University of Strathclyde] at 04:03 23 October 2014

Preludiji ("Preludes") and Dvanajst etud ('Twelve Etudes") for piano by

JanezMaticic (1926).
Some composers of the first generation following Kogoj and Osterc
experienced their own creative dramas because of the Communist aesthetic
blockade. In 1965, Srecko Koporc died in complete isolation. Pavle Merku
(1927) turned to expressionism with a cantata for baritone, mixed choir, two
pianos and percussion, entitled O detomorilki Mariji Ferrar ("On the Child-
Killer Marija Ferrar"), while Primoz RamovS escaped from neoclassicism to
the sonorities of the avant-garde. Pavel Sivic (1908) responded most
actively to the void resulting from the loss of historical memory and in 1957
formed the first postwar progressive musical group, Collegium Musicum. In
concerts with this group, he systematically informed Slovenes of the
previously suppressed trends of twentieth century music: Stravinsky,
Hindemith and SchOnberg, as well as the works of American, Swiss and
other composers.
Collegium Musicum was the echo of great events in new music: summer
courses in Darmstadt (1951), the Warsaw Autumn (1957) and the Zagreb
Biennial (1961). Frontiers were opened. The Ljubljana Opera made
successful guest performances with the opera Zaljubljen v tri oranie ("In
Love with Three Oranges") by Prokofiev at the Holland Festival and in
Paris; while at home, one of the fathers of the prewar modem, Marij Kogoj,
was back among the Slovenes with the first postwar restaging of the opera
Cme Maske ("Black Masks"). In 1957, radio and television acquired a firm
organizational structure. A number of ensembles formed within their
framework, such as the Symphony Orchestra, the Chamber Choir, the Dance
Orchestra and others, which were on a European level. Porene, a student in
Rome, beginning with expressionistically perceived works (the cycle of
poems Mother, and choruses), wrote the dodecaphonic Invenzione variata
for piano. Alojz Srebotnjak (1931), a student of P. R. Flicker in London,
later followed the same path.

151
 Nationalities Papers

At the beginning of the sixties, authors were again the first to make a
decisive break with all that had been previously suppressed. Art strove to
become autonomous, modern in structure and existential in content. In
music, the reaction came from a generation of creators born in the decade
preceding the war. In 1960, Ivo PetriC united them into a group of
composers under the name of Pro musica viva. Among its members were
Ivo PetriC, Jakob Jez, Milan Stibilj, Igor Stuhec, Alojz Srebotnjak, Darijan
BoziC, Lojze LebiC.all of differing styles and education. Their common
desire was to abandon their marginal positions, surpass the prevailing
academism and restore contact with the prewar modern, Kogoj and Osterc,
that is, to fill the informational void and bring Slovene music back into
Downloaded by [University of Strathclyde] at 04:03 23 October 2014

European contemporaneity—in other words, to a new conception of music

which, according to Webern, arranges musical material with the help of
lines, electro-acoustical music, Varese's concept of the movement of sound
in space and Adomo's Philosophy of New Music.
Independently but stemming from the same incentives as the Die Reihe
group in 'Vienna (Ligeti, Cerha and Schwerstick), Ivo PetriC formed the
Slavko Osterc ensemble in Ljubljana, which became the performing herald
of views advocated by Pro musica viva. The ensemble's progressive
program policy inspired many domestic and internationally reputed
contemporaries to join the circle of composers writing music for the
ensemble. The members of Pro musica viva realized their creative ambitions
in various ways: Jakob Jez (1928) in an expressive playfulness and choral
expressiveness (cantata Dofraig amors for choir, mandolin, lute, guitar and
percussion), Milan Stibilj (1929) in the direction of serialism (Epervier de ta
faiblesse, Domine, for reciter and percussion), Alojz Srebotnjak (1931) in an
aphoristic form and dodecaphony (Microsongs for voice and 13 instruments)
Ivo PetriC (1931) in a colorful sonority and aleatory (Croquis sonores for
harp and chamber ensemble), Darijan BoZiC (1933) in the "acoustical
theater."
For this generation of composers and for Primoz RamovS as an older
adherent outside the group, the only existing truth was their own personal
truth. They no longer believed in social truth and expressed their doubt in
aggressive sounds with a tinge of catastrophism resembling expressionism:
PrimoZ RamovS in Simfonija 68 ("Symphony 68"), Igor Stuhec (1932)
in Entuziazmi za orkester ("Enthusiasm for Orchestra") and Lojze LebiC
(1934) in Pofgana trava ("Burnt Grass") for voice and symphony orchestra.
Pro musica viva and its performances of works from the works of Ligeti,
Lutoslawsky, Pendereck,- Ben and Xenakis were a musical spring which,
without doubt, passed all too quickly. But to this day it has remained an
unsurpassed example of collective creative enthusiasm.

152
 Lebit: Slovene Music

The sixties have borne yet other blossoms: the "Festival of

Contemporary Chamber Music" at the renowned health resort of Radenci on
the border between Austria, Hungary and Slovenia; the "Tribune of
Yugoslav Creativity" in the Croatian resort of Opatija on the Adriatic Coast.
If to this we add the Tenth International Congress of Musicologists
(International Musicological Society) which met in Ljubljana (1967) thanks
to the efforts of Dr. Dragotin Cvetko, one might say that the sixties were one
of those favorable periods for Slovene music, referred to in the socialist
world as a liberal "thaw."
After the fade-out of Pro musica viva, progressive Slovene music
appeared to be at a standstill. There were no recognizable schools, groups or
Downloaded by [University of Strathclyde] at 04:03 23 October 2014

clear styles. Individual composers appearing on the scene began openly to

contemplate the "phenomenon of return" (Pavel MihelciC, Maks StrmCnik,
Alojz AjdiC). Similar to the great composers of the international arena
(Schnittke or Rihm), Slovene creators began to withdraw, each in his own
way, from the threatening academism of former avant-garde practices. With
Slovenes, the aging of new music did not happen in a pessimistic manner.
Each Slovene composer searched for a path to the self, developing his own
individual style. Although faced with the dilemma of musical language, they
all created important works: Jakob Jef, Pogled narave ("Glimpse of
Nature") for two voices and instruments; UroS Krek, Sinfonia per archi;
Lojze LebiC, Novembrske pesmi ("November Songs") for voice and
symphony orchestra; Janez Maticic, Palpitations for piano; Pavle Merku, the
rhapsody Ali sijaj, sijaj sonce ("Let the Sun Shine") for strings; Pavel Sivic,
the opera Cortezova vrnitev ("The Return of Cortez").
It is interesting that Slovene composers who remained at home never
managed to bid a final farewell to romantic subjectivity—as though it were
inherently "Slovene." The case was different with those who went abroad:
Janez MatiCiC, Janko Jezovsek, Uros Rojko, and, in particular, the French
Slovene and cosmopolitan Vinko Globokar (1934). As a perfect
instrumentalist, conductor, composer, teacher and publicist, Globokar
masterfully navigates between music as a dangerous game of sounds, and
music as a social function. Each of his great works (in recent years, the
extensive scenic oratorio Les Emigre's and Hello, Do You Hear Me? for
symphony orchestra, jazz group and choir) is a creative response to today's
postmodernistic dilemmas.
At home in Slovenia today, these challenges are confronted by a new,
talented generation of composers (Bor Turel, Brina Jez, Aldo Kumar, and
Tomaz Svete). These are the intelligent children of a post-industrial and now
already post-communist society. Lost faith in linear progress and the

153
 Nationalities Papers

collapse of unifying communist ideals have left them in an empty space.

They have been deprived of the burden of rebellion and opposition, together
with the social motivation for creative responsibility which had inspired
previous generations. Will they resort to aestheticism?
The conjunction of postmodemistic trends with the disintegration of
socialist realism and Marxist ideologies will still require further investigation
in the European arena. There is no doubt that Uros Rojko (1954) and his
contemporaries mark the end (or beginning) of yet another circle of Slovene
music: from premodernism where music served the needs of national
preservation, to modernism where, already before the war and again in the
sixties, it was relieved of nonmusical tasks, and finally, to today's
Downloaded by [University of Strathclyde] at 04:03 23 October 2014

postmodernism where music is returning to itself: a live circling of spirit

which cannot be caught in the constraints of "Slovene music" without
forcibly stopping the extraordinary dynamics of change.
Nevertheless, is "Slovene music" a myth, or reality? Does music
continuously created over a thousand years on this European periphery have
sufficient authenticity? Does it have "l'esprit Slovene"...?
In keeping with their physical experience, the character of Slovenes has
been formed by a constricted yet diversified space. They have a feeling for
form, for poetry more than prose, and for chamber music more than
extensive creations. Their tendency toward lyrical intimacy and compassion
is already evident in the Slovene language, one of the very few to use the
dual case. They are closer to emotionality than technical rationality, thus
revealing the archetype of their Slav ancestors. Perhaps this is why meta-
musical ideas, musical theater, electronic and computer music have not
gained widespread recognition.
However, Slovene music does not only thrive within state boundaries. A
unified Slovene cultural space has linked musicians in the regions of Trieste
and Veneto (Italy), Carinthia (Austria) and the region of Porabje (The Raab
Valley in Hungary). Following the democratic changes implemented two
years ago, national reconciliation and the first World Slovene Congress, the
unified Slovene cultural space is uniting Slovenes from all over the world.
Almost a third of Slovenes live in the diaspora extending from Trieste,
Klagenfurt, Vienna and Rome to Cleveland, Toronto, Buenos Aires and
Sydney. Everywhere there are prominent musicians—enough to form a
complete, prestigious conservatory (composers: Peter Velikonja, Uros Rojko,
Janko Jezovsek, Janez MatiCiC, Bo2idar Kos, Marjan Mozetich, Bozidar
Kantuser, and Pavel Sifier, and artists: Igor Ozim, Irena Grafenauer, Mariana
LipovSek...). Europe will never be able to repay Slovenes, who have
travelled abroad and enriched the treasury of world music for centuries.

154
 Lebil: Slovene Music

The Cankarjev Dom Congress Center in Ljubljana (1982) is now an

internationally renowned center of artists and scientists. Three symphony
orchestras, two operas, numerous chamber music groups and soloists,
supported by a host of music enthusiasts, are a strong foundation for musical
development Slovenia's capital, Ljubljana, and its second most important
city, Maribor, have been crossroads for the most highly reputed international
artists for many years and could become the leading cultural and music
centers connecting Vienna and Graz with Trieste and Venice.
As a nation, Slovenes today have achieved a mature self-confidence.
They are no longer troubled by questions on the implications of small and
large, central and marginal, rich and poor. Even their previous historical
Downloaded by [University of Strathclyde] at 04:03 23 October 2014

delay is no longer a burden. Slovenia has preserved specific aesthetic values

longer than some other dynamic, European countries, and this has helped
many of its composers and their works to achieve a certain integrity and
distinct personality.
Slovenia's entire past, significantly interwoven with its music, has been
characterized by a concentric accumulation of desires, thoughts and actions
oriented towards cultural and political independence. The present
determination of Slovenes to attain independence is not another romantic,
new spring of nations. It is simply a reassertion of their original intention
which was denied them in 1848, 1918 and in 1945. Slovenia's desire is to
join the European family as an independent nation with its own original
musical values.

(September, 1991)

* The composers and works mentioned in this contribution only serve as an

illustration and may be replaced in some sections without changing their
meaning and value. Despite the immense richness of Slovene musical
creativity and the extensive opuses of individual composers, the titles
quoted are limited to certain works which deserve attention.
1
Carniolus—an inhabitant of the Duchy of Carniola, the central Slovene
province. Since 1461, its capital city has been Ljubljana, also the seat of
the duke and bishop. A small town of noblemen and merchants, pipers and
musicians, it corresponded to similar towns in Central and Western Europe.

155