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Weiss, Jernej, ur. 2026. Skladateljska društva nekoč in danes: preplet stanovskega in nacionalnega | Composers’ Societies Past and Present: Combining the Professional and the National
Koper/Ljubljana: Založba Univerze na Primorskem in Festival Ljubljana. https://doi.org/10.26493/978-961-293-555-9.311-318
© 2026 Niall O’Loughlin

The Slovene Composer Ivo Petrić and Društvo
slovenskih skladateljev

Niall O’Loughlin
Univerza v Loughboroughu
Loughborough University

As Slovenia emerged from the Second World War, in addition to the con-
siderable amount of rebuilding to be done, there was a need for the reviv-
al of the strong musical culture that had existed in Slovenia before the war.
Composers such as Lucijan Marija Škerjanc, Blaž Arnič and Marjan Kozina
continued to produce impressive music during the war and in the years fol-
lowing. It was now important to nurture and encourage others to be active
composers. Very important is the fact that the influential Škerjanc taught
composition to a number of younger musicians and there was the pres-
ence of the Slovenian Philharmonic Orchestra (Orkester Slovenske filhar-
monije) which must have acted as an encouragement. It was essential, how-
ever, for a degree of organisation to focus the progress quickly and in the
right direction. This came from a group comprising a number of compos-
ers, who aimed to create a society that provided a firm base for the devel-
opment of musical composition. This society founded after the end of the
Second World War, the Society of Slovene Composers (Društvo slovenskih
skladateljev, abbreviated to DSS) has operated for the enormous benefit of
Slovene composers for the last 80 years.
The most obvious requirement for this society was to collect to-
gether the music of a large and comprehensive group of active compos-
ers, organise it for performances, and when possible to publish as much
printed music as finances allowed. There was a small collection of publi-
cations from 1954 of works by Srečko Koporc, Vilko Ukmar, Pavel Šivic

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