490 Years of Croatian Composers

The Cantus Ensemble held a concert titled ‘490 Years of Croatian Composers’ at the iconic Zagreb concert hall and an incomparable cultural institution the Croatian Music Institute, on 27 November 2017.

 

Since its founding in 2001, the Cantus Ensemble has lived in a musical symbiosis with contemporary music composers, especially Croatian ones. By exploring, discovering and presenting the new and the unexplored, and their meticulous and responsible approach to the music of the 20th and 21st centuries, the Ensemble has filled a nearly empty space on the then local music scene and became the spearhead of the promotion of Croatian music and its authors.

 

By reclaiming numerous almost-forgotten scores and bringing new life into many respectable pieces, the Cantus Ensemble has dedicated much of its effort on cooperation with Croatian composers of all generations who systematically and with dedication participated, just like the ensemble itself, in creating the current concert life, while simultaneously educating the audience.

 

 

The ‘490 Years of Croatian Composers’ project, therefore, reveals the interrelationship and collaboration between composers and musicians whose common goal is to genuinely convey musical content to the audience, but is, above all, the Ensemble’s concert celebration, tribute and recognition of prominent Croatian composers of different generations who celebrated their milestone birthdays in 2017: Željko

Brkanović, Dubravko Detoni and Josip Magdić (80th), Zoran Juranić (70th), Ivo Josipović (60th), Olja Jelaska (50th), Dubravko Palanović (40th) and Tomislav Oliver (30th).    

 

The Cantus Ensemble performed pieces by composers it had already performed and promoted many times before with various compositions, both at local and foreign venues, so this is merely a small cross section of collaborations and partnerships that the Ensemble has been working on since 2001.

 

The program of the concert:

Željko Brkanović (80): Caryatids, for alt-triplex and chamber orchestra

Dubravko Detoni (80): dolce furioso, for chamber orchestra

Josip Magdić (80): Cantus “Ogulini Magae” for chamber orchestra, Op. 183

Zoran Juranić (70): Ciaccona concertante

Ivo Josipović (60): Musicam psalite, for string quartet, flute, clarinet, trumpet, piano and percussions

 

Olja Jelaska (50): Butterfly, three movements for seven instruments

            African violet

            Evening primrose

            Rose petals

 

Dubravko Palanović (40): Mozaik, for nine instruments

Tomislav Oliver (30): Obsidienne, for chamber orchestra