Musicologica 1/2013

The generation of Slovak composers known as Slovak Musical Modernism, who emerged in the late 1920s and during the 1930s, adopted a concept of creative synthesis of the national sources (especially inspirations from folk music) with the influences of Europea impressionist and expressionist music. One of the Slovak Musical Modernism composers was Alexander Moyzes (1906-1984). The jazz elements that appeared in his early compositions were an exceptional impulse and response to the avant-garde musical milieu of the 1920s’ Prague, where Moyzes studied. However, such compositions met with sharp objections from the music critics in Bratislava. This not only turned Moyzes away from using jazz elements for the rest of his compositional career, but was also followed by their long-term absence in Slovak music for stylistic and political reasons. Although a short revival occurred when some of Slovak Music’s avant-garde emerged in the 1960s (Jozef Malovec and Tadeáš Salva, for example), jazz did not become a legitimately accepted source of new creative projects until the next generation of postmodern composers in the last quarter of the 20th century. Its shaping personalities, such as Peter Martinček, Norbert Bodnár and Peter Breiner, erased the traditional and conventional boundaries between the musical genres in contemporary Slovak music.