Page 328 - Weiss, Jernej, ur./ed. 2026 Skladateljska društva nekoč in danes.../Composers’ Societies Past and Present...

Skladateljska društva nekoč in danes | Composers’ Societies Past and Present
rather rigid post-war era of agitprop-influenced state-directed cultural pol-
25
icy. Of course, the influence of politics on the musical scene in Yugoslavia
at that time was, for the most part, indirect rather than direct, and mainly
took the form of financial pressures and penalties.
The members of the Slavko Osterc Ensemble premiered a total of 65
works by nineteen Slovene composers, with 40 of these premiere perfor-
t2 mances taking place abroad and 25 in Slovenia. 26
These figures indicate that the Slavko Osterc Ensemble was above all
interested in the promotion and affirmation of works by Slovene compos-
ers (DSS members) abroad. More than half of the premieres – 33 to be pre-
cise – were of works by members of the Pro musica viva group. The majority
of these (19) took place abroad. Among the members with the largest num-
ber of works premiered, we find Ivo Petrić (13, 9 abroad), Igor Štuhec (9, 5
abroad), Jakob Jež (5, 3 abroad) and Lojze Lebič (5, 2 abroad).
This would appear to confirm Petrić’s opinion that, despite the change
of name, the members of Pro musica viva had plenty of opportunities for
performances of the works they composed for the Slavko Osterc Ensem-
ble. The Ensemble did not, however, only favour new works by members
27
of Pro musica viva, but incorporated into its repertoire works reflecting the
full range of compositional techniques and aesthetic directions in contem-
porary Slovene creativity.
Undoubtedly of decisive importance for the Ensemble’s activities was
the fact that almost all the works performed by the Ensemble were printed
as sheet music by Edicije DSS even before they were performed. In this way,
the DSS provided the necessary performance materials and actively, if in-
directly, supported the work of the Slavko Osterc Ensemble. Given the En-
semble’s always precarious financial situation, it would have been consider-
ably more difficult, if not impossible, for it to maintain its activities without
the help of DSS. It may therefore be said that the programming decisions
28
made by Petrić as the artistic director of the Ensemble had a considerable
influence on the situation at Edicije DSS, even before his official appoint-
ment as its editor in 1970.

25 Sonja Kralj, “Sobivanje družbenega, stanovskega in umetniškega v zgodovini Društ-
va slovenskih skladateljev” (PhD, University of Ljubljana, 2011), 158.
26 Ibid., 90–5
27 Štular, Glasbeno delo Ansambla Slavko Osterc, 5.
28 Ivo Petrić, “Vprašanje brez odgovora,” Sodobnost, no. 4 (1963): 380–2.

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