Page 209 - Weiss, Jernej, ur. 2018. Nova glasba v “novi” Evropi med obema svetovnima vojnama ?? New Music in the “New” Europe Between the Two World Wars. Koper/Ljubljana: Založba Univerze na Primorskem in Festival Ljubljana. Studia musicologica Labacensia, 2
P. 209
alois hába and slovene students of composition ...
that his conception of study was as free as possible. The syllabus and tradi-
tional forms were, for him, merely a framework which he filled in with his
own judgements. He did not even teach his students detailed rules of com-
position, preferring to give free rein to their individual creative fantasy.
It is the systematic nature of justification that thus appears to be one of
the principal differences between Hába and Osterc, reflected both in their
compositions and in their writings. Hába was not, of course, Osterc’s only
model. Even after his return from Prague, Osterc frequently emphasised
his ideological orientation based on “creative intuitions” or “free expres-
sion” that would not allow him to follow any kind of authority: “Now it is
the duty of the young generation to break with Petrushka, when the ideolo-
gy of Schönberg, Berg and Hába is already getting old, and it is the duty of
the youngest to break with Schönberg and the others.” And further: “Mu-
sic has even greater possibilities of development!”19 It is evident from these
quotations that for Osterc the most important signpost in creative work was
the retreat from the existing or the “new”, although he never succeeded in
defining it entirely unambiguously, either compositionally or theoretically.
He was thus above all someone who spoke about the new, and less a creator
of the new – something pointed out by Leon Stefanija in his article Osterc
in Hába (Osterc and Hába).20
Shortly after his return from Prague in 1927, Osterc succeeded in gath-
ering around himself a generation of younger composers who, as a result of
his later contacts with Hába, would go on to study in Prague. They have be-
come known as the “Osterc School”, although apart from a commitment to
predominantly instrumental music, it would be difficult to attribute a com-
mon artistic focus to them.
Osterc’s first successor in Prague was Srečko Koporc, who graduated in
composition under Rudolf Karel, a former student of Dvořák’s, in 1929. Al-
though Koporc did not compose even a single quarter-tone piece, he clear-
ly became very familiar with Hába’s teachings in Prague, as demonstrated
by his exact description of Hába’s teaching in an article entitled Alois Hába
in njegova četrttonska teorija (Alois Hába and his quarter-tone theory) pub-
lished in Cerkveni glasbenik (Church Musician) in 1928.21 It is interesting to
note that, following his return from the Czech capital, Koporc produced a
19 Slavko Osterc, Zvuk 3, no. 6 (1935): 191.
20 Stefanija, “Osterc in Hába,” 33–41.
21 Srečko Koporc, “Alois Hába in njegova četrttonska teorija (Črtica ob priliki izdane
knjige: Neue Harmonielehre),” Cerkveni glasbenik 51, no. 7–8 (1928): 111–112.
207
that his conception of study was as free as possible. The syllabus and tradi-
tional forms were, for him, merely a framework which he filled in with his
own judgements. He did not even teach his students detailed rules of com-
position, preferring to give free rein to their individual creative fantasy.
It is the systematic nature of justification that thus appears to be one of
the principal differences between Hába and Osterc, reflected both in their
compositions and in their writings. Hába was not, of course, Osterc’s only
model. Even after his return from Prague, Osterc frequently emphasised
his ideological orientation based on “creative intuitions” or “free expres-
sion” that would not allow him to follow any kind of authority: “Now it is
the duty of the young generation to break with Petrushka, when the ideolo-
gy of Schönberg, Berg and Hába is already getting old, and it is the duty of
the youngest to break with Schönberg and the others.” And further: “Mu-
sic has even greater possibilities of development!”19 It is evident from these
quotations that for Osterc the most important signpost in creative work was
the retreat from the existing or the “new”, although he never succeeded in
defining it entirely unambiguously, either compositionally or theoretically.
He was thus above all someone who spoke about the new, and less a creator
of the new – something pointed out by Leon Stefanija in his article Osterc
in Hába (Osterc and Hába).20
Shortly after his return from Prague in 1927, Osterc succeeded in gath-
ering around himself a generation of younger composers who, as a result of
his later contacts with Hába, would go on to study in Prague. They have be-
come known as the “Osterc School”, although apart from a commitment to
predominantly instrumental music, it would be difficult to attribute a com-
mon artistic focus to them.
Osterc’s first successor in Prague was Srečko Koporc, who graduated in
composition under Rudolf Karel, a former student of Dvořák’s, in 1929. Al-
though Koporc did not compose even a single quarter-tone piece, he clear-
ly became very familiar with Hába’s teachings in Prague, as demonstrated
by his exact description of Hába’s teaching in an article entitled Alois Hába
in njegova četrttonska teorija (Alois Hába and his quarter-tone theory) pub-
lished in Cerkveni glasbenik (Church Musician) in 1928.21 It is interesting to
note that, following his return from the Czech capital, Koporc produced a
19 Slavko Osterc, Zvuk 3, no. 6 (1935): 191.
20 Stefanija, “Osterc in Hába,” 33–41.
21 Srečko Koporc, “Alois Hába in njegova četrttonska teorija (Črtica ob priliki izdane
knjige: Neue Harmonielehre),” Cerkveni glasbenik 51, no. 7–8 (1928): 111–112.
207
