Page 154 - Weiss, Jernej, ur./ed. 2025. Glasbena interpretacija: med umetniškim in znanstvenim┊Music Interpretation: Between the Artistic and the Scientific. Koper/Ljubljana: Založba Univerze na Primorskem in Festival Ljubljana. Studia musicologica Labacensia, 8

glasbena interpretacija ... | music interpretation ...
23
Gustav Mahler. Although it is not known precisely when and how Matačić
first came across this work, it is possible that he heard it in Vienna as a boy.
The opera is a late Romantic work in which one can hear the influences of
the Hungarian temperament and of organ music – in other words of Bruck-
ner. It would therefore seem that the work appealed to Matačić for a varie-
ty of reasons.
The numerous performances conducted by Matačić in the 1922–23 and
1923–24 seasons included 14 different operatic works. Altogether total 123
performances and 12 premieres, nine of which he conducted for the first
time. He regularly received good reviews. The experience he gained at the
24
Ljubljana Opera was invaluable to the young Matačić – barely 25 years old
at the time – both for the development of his practical skills as a conductor
and in terms of establishing himself and growing artistically, a process that
would later intensify further.
In Ljubljana he also got the opportunity to conduct symphonic mu-
sic. Here too, he showed that he was developing into an excellent conduc-
tor, choosing works that later became part of his core repertoire. Ljublja-
na did not have a permanent symphony orchestra in the years after the
First World War. In 1922 the Union of Musicians assembled an ad hoc
45-piece orchestra, with most of the players coming from the Ljubljana Op-
era Orchestra. For his first major symphonic concert Matačić chose Smet-
ana, Wagner, Tchaikovsky and Bruckner. The following year, he conducted
the same ensemble in a concert marking the 40th anniversary of Wagner’s
death, with a programme consisting of extracts from The Flying Dutchman,
Parsifal and Tristan and Isolde. Although these performances received ex-
cellent reviews, the critics were clear: Ljubljana needed a bigger, permanent
symphony orchestra, since major artistic achievements could hardly be ex-
pected with an ad hoc ensemble. In the end, it was the lack of funding avail-
able for a permanent symphony orchestra that led Matačić to leave Ljublja-
na in 1924 and take up the post of conductor of the Belgrade Opera. The
latter institution had incomparably greater resources than Ljubljana’s op-
era company, which meant more opportunities for creative achievements.
25
Matačić’s career progression followed the same path as that of most other
conductors. As he himself put it in later years:
23 Th. Antonicek, “Schmidt, Franz,” Oesterreichisches Musiklexion Online,
https://www.biographien.ac.at/oebl/oebl_S/Schmid_Franz_1874_1939.xml.
24 Cf. Košir, Kuret, Bedjanič, Lovro Matačić v Sloveniji, 47–64.
25 Sedak, ed., Matačić, 41.

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