Cantus Ensemble: New music, new friends

In 2025, Hash­tag Ensem­ble is turn­ing its focus to what is hap­pen­ing beyond Poland’s bor­ders. We are invit­ing ensem­bles that, like us, exper­i­ment, col­lab­o­rate with com­posers, and seek new roles and con­texts for con­tem­po­rary music.

In Octo­ber, we are join­ing forces with the Croa­t­ian Can­tus Ensem­ble – an old­er col­league in new music. For over 20 years, this ensem­ble has been based in Zagreb, where on Octo­ber 13 Hash­tag Ensem­ble will open the sea­son, fol­lowed five days lat­er by Can­tus Ensem­ble per­form­ing in War­saw’s Ocho­ta dis­trict with a var­ied Croa­t­ian pro­gramme. The two groups will be brought togeth­er by a new work from Żane­ta Rydzews­ka – Top Five. 

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In 2025, Hash­tag Ensem­ble is turn­ing its focus to what is hap­pen­ing beyond Poland’s bor­ders. We are invit­ing ensem­bles that, like us, exper­i­ment, col­lab­o­rate with com­posers, and seek new roles and con­texts for con­tem­po­rary music.

In Octo­ber, we are join­ing forces with the Croa­t­ian Can­tus Ensem­ble – an old­er col­league in new music. For over 20 years, this ensem­ble has been based in Zagreb, where on Octo­ber 13 Hash­tag Ensem­ble will open the sea­son, fol­lowed five days lat­er by Can­tus Ensem­ble per­form­ing in War­saw’s Ocho­ta dis­trict with a var­ied Croa­t­ian pro­gram. The two groups will be brought togeth­er by a new work from Żane­ta Rydzews­ka – Top Five.

Programme:

Ivan Josip Skender Five Sketch­es for Three

Dubravko Palanović The sto­ry of a lost faith*

Ante Knešau­rek On a Moment of Loneliness

Żane­ta Rydzews­kaTop Five** (with Hash­tag Ensem­ble)
San­da MajurecI ritorni

Berislav Šipuš Dick Tra­cy and the Most Pecu­liar Case of All – Falling in Love

*world pre­miere

Performers:

Can­tus Ensemble

Teo Devčić vio­lin

Tvrtko Pavlin vio­la

Jasen Chelfi cel­lo

Ana Batini­ca flutes

Iva Ledenko oboe

Dani­jel Mar­ti­nović clar­inet

Sre­bren­ka Pol­jak piano

Fran Krsto Šercer per­cus­sion

Berislav Šipuš con­duc­tor

Hash­tag Ensem­ble
(in Top Five)
Paweł Janas accor­dion
Mar­ta Piórkows­ka vio­lin
Alek­san­dra Demows­ka-Made­js­ka vio­la
Dominik Pło­cińs­ki cel­lo
Mateusz Los­ka dou­ble bass

Production:

pro­gramme con­cept: Can­tus Ensem­ble                  
pro­duc­tion: Lil­ian­na Krych
visu­al iden­ti­ty: Alek­san­dra Ołdak
sound engi­neer­ing: Kos­ma Standera
co-organ­i­sa­tion: Can­tus Ensemble

Hash­tag Lab Con­tem­po­rary Music Space is co-fund­ed by the City of War­saw.
The media patron of the Hash­tag Lab Con­tem­po­rary Music Space is POLMIC​.PL., Gaze­ta Wybor­cza and Dwój­ka Pol­skie Radio.

Project sup­port­ed by the Croa­t­ian Com­posers’ Soci­ety and the Min­istry of Cul­ture of the Repub­lic of Croatia.

If you’d like to know more about the artists / To read more about artists:

Can­tus Ensemble

Over near­ly two decades of the ensem­ble’s exis­tence, soloists and con­duc­tors have changed, as have con­cert venues, fes­ti­vals, con­ti­nents, and the com­posers, scores and con­cepts — but their pro­gram­mat­ic axis has not: music of the sec­ond half of the 20th cen­tu­ry and the begin­ning of the 21st.

The milieu from which the Music Bien­nale Zagreb (MBZ) grew — form­ing the ensem­ble’s pro­gram­mat­ic and ide­o­log­i­cal nucle­us — had, inter­est­ing­ly, nev­er seri­ous­ly con­sid­ered found­ing an insti­tu­tion­alised group that could sup­port and devel­op its uncon­ven­tion­al, some­times even avant-garde pulse between fes­ti­vals. In the musi­cal abun­dance of the 1980s it was enough to hear con­tem­po­rary sound once every two years; dur­ing the war and in the imme­di­ate post-war peri­od there were no favourable con­di­tions for it.

The turn­ing point came in 2001. Anoth­er Bien­nale was approach­ing with a ready reper­toire, and Zagreb had both expe­ri­enced and young musi­cians. With that event in mind, a tem­po­rary res­i­dent ensem­ble was formed. It proved so out­stand­ing, how­ev­er, that the fes­ti­val spark ignit­ed a fire — and the ensem­ble quick­ly acquired per­ma­nence and sta­bil­i­ty. It ceased to be “tem­po­rary”, and short­ly after­wards took the name Can­tus (Latin for “singing”). Its mis­sion was set.

As Trpimir Mataso­vić put it (2009): “their aim was not for the pre­sen­ta­tion of avant-garde music to be an end in itself — it was mere­ly the foun­da­tion on which inter­pre­ta­tion is built.”

Berislav Šipuš (b. 1958, Zagreb) has direct­ed Can­tus Ensem­ble since its found­ing in 2001.

He stud­ied art his­to­ry at the Fac­ul­ty of Human­i­ties and Social Sci­ences at the Uni­ver­si­ty of Zagreb, and com­po­si­tion at the Zagreb Acad­e­my of Music (diplo­ma 1987, class of Stanko Hor­vat). He con­tin­ued his stud­ies with Gilbert Bosco in Udine and with François-Bernard Mâche and Ian­nis Xenakis at the UPIC Elec­tron­ic Stu­dio in Paris. He refined his con­duct­ing with Vladimir Kran­jče­vić, Željko Brkanović, Krešimir Šipuš, and with Milan Hor­vat at the Uni­ver­si­ty of Music and Per­form­ing Arts in Graz.

He worked as répéti­teur-pianist of the Bal­let of the Croa­t­ian Nation­al The­atre in Zagreb, as a music the­o­ry teacher at the Elly Bašić Music School in Zagreb, as répéti­teur-pianist of the Bermu­da Bal­let, and as a pro­duc­er at the Vatroslav Lisin­s­ki Con­cert Hall. From 2001 to 2005 he was direc­tor of the Zagreb Phil­har­mon­ic Orches­tra.
He was pro­duc­er of the Music Bien­nale Zagreb and, from 1997 to 2011, its artis­tic direc­tor.
He lived in Milan, col­lab­o­rat­ing with Teatro alla Scala as répéti­teur-pianist for the Bal­let and Opera, assis­tant con­duc­tor in the Opera, and orches­tral con­duc­tor in bal­let productions.

He is cur­rent­ly a full pro­fes­sor at the Depart­ment of Com­po­si­tion and Music The­o­ry at the Zagreb Acad­e­my of Music, and since 2019 has served as head of that department.

For his com­po­si­tions he has received numer­ous nation­al and inter­na­tion­al awards, includ­ing the Sev­en Sec­re­taries of SKOJ Award, the Josip Štol­cer Slaven­s­ki Award from the news­pa­per Vjes­nik, and in 2004 the title of Cheva­lier de l’Or­dre des Arts et des Let­tres award­ed by the Min­istry of Cul­ture of the French Repub­lic.
From Decem­ber 2011 he served as Deputy Min­is­ter of Cul­ture, and from April 2015 to Jan­u­ary 2016 as Min­is­ter of Cul­ture of the Repub­lic of Croa­t­ia.

Dubravko Palanović (b. 1977, Zagreb) — com­pos­er and dou­ble bassist. He grad­u­at­ed from the Zagreb Acad­e­my of Music in dou­ble bass (Josip Novosel) and com­po­si­tion (Željko Brkanović). He was a mem­ber of the Gus­tav Mahler Youth Orches­tra under Clau­dio Abba­do, and cur­rent­ly per­forms pro­fes­sion­al­ly as a dou­ble bassist with the Zagreb Phil­har­mon­ic Orches­tra and is the founder of the ensem­ble Acoustic Project, in which he com­pos­es, arranges and performs.

As a com­pos­er he has col­lab­o­rat­ed with the Zagreb Phil­har­mon­ic Orches­tra, Croa­t­ian Radio and Tele­vi­sion, Zagreb Soloists and Can­tus Ensem­ble, among oth­ers. His cat­a­logue includes Con­cert Over­ture, In Medio Ignis, Sym­pho­ny “Bright Day” and Tes­la.

He has won numer­ous com­po­si­tion awards, includ­ing Reinl-Stiftung (Vien­na), the Rec­tor’s Award, and the Mau­rice Rav­el Com­po­si­tion Com­pe­ti­tion. His works have been per­formed at the Music Bien­nale Zagreb, ISCM World Music Days and Moscow Autumn fes­ti­vals, and released on record­ings by Can­tus and Acoustic Project.

He has also cre­at­ed two music-the­atre works for chil­dren: The Frosty Ones (2013) and Christ­mas with the Frosty Ones (2019).

Programme notes

A Sto­ry of Lost Faith
This is a sto­ry about lost ideals, about lost faith in peo­ple and in love, about lost desires, dreams, and hopes—about being lost itself, as well as about inner strug­gle and tur­moil.
Peo­ple are, in essence, self-destruc­tive beings, and too much har­mo­ny, peace, and “beau­ty” quick­ly bores them. There­fore, in my com­po­si­tions, I empha­size “beau­ty,” but use it only in small dos­es.
Dubravko Palanović

San­da Majurec: I ritorni
The com­po­si­tion I ritorni for flute, clar­inet, vio­lin, piano and cel­lo was writ­ten in 2013. For­mal­ly, it is based on the ritor­nel­lo prin­ci­ple — both on a glob­al lev­el, in the rela­tion­ships between the move­ments, and with­in each of the five move­ments, all of which are struc­tured as ritornellos.

The world pre­miere was giv­en in 2014 by the ensem­ble Glazbene staze. In 2016 the work was pre­sent­ed at Glazbe­na Trib­i­na in Opati­ja (per­formed by mdi ensem­ble) and at the Uni­ver­si­ty of Music and Per­form­ing Arts Vien­na as part of the Fes­ti­val of Croa­t­ian Music in Vien­na and the project Women Com­posers from Slove­nia, Croa­t­ia, Mace­do­nia, and Ser­bia (2016).
The work has also been per­formed by Quasars Ensem­ble and Can­tus Ensem­ble, includ­ing in Zagreb, Vien­na and Cologne.

Ante Knešau­rek: On a Moment of Lone­li­ness
Every­one who cre­ates has, I think, expe­ri­enced soli­tude — that moment that deep­ens time and mer­ci­less­ly extends its lim­its. For a moment it ren­ders us help­less.
A step towards exit­ing the labyrinth of soli­tude, and the courage to con­front it, is at least a step towards the “new”.

Ivan Josip Skender: Five Sketch­es for Three
The com­po­si­tion Five Sketch­es was writ­ten in 2015, com­mis­sioned by my long-time col­lab­o­ra­tors — the sis­ters Zita and Nadia Var­ga — and com­posed for piano trio (piano, clar­inet, cel­lo).
Over time the work has been per­formed in var­i­ous ver­sions, includ­ing for piano, clar­inet and vio­la.
It con­sists of five move­ments of vary­ing char­ac­ter and length, which per­form­ers may arrange in any order — depend­ing on the atmos­phere they wish to cre­ate, or sim­ply accord­ing to their own preferences.

Berislav Šipuš: Dick Tra­cy and the Most Pecu­liar Case of All – Falling in Love
The work Dick Tra­cy and the Most Pecu­liar Case of All – Falling in Love for sev­en per­form­ers is the fifth part of the Dick Tra­cy… cycle.
Like the Tan Het­ti cycle (three parts of which are already com­plete — Tin Hat­ti and Ten Hot­ti — with more await­ing com­ple­tion), this project explores ques­tions of cham­ber sound, its colour and form, and draws on the expe­ri­ences of music the­atre, while striv­ing to retain ele­ments of absolute music.

The work Dick Tra­cy for solo piano, ded­i­cat­ed to my teacher Stanko Hor­vat, is a more inti­mate cycle, deal­ing as it does with the per­son­al prob­lems of the main pro­tag­o­nist and his clients — grad­u­al­ly revealed, like a tan­gled ball of rid­dles slow­ly unwinding.

Until now Dick Tra­cy had been solv­ing the case of Pret­ty Pieta with the help of the bass clar­inet, then The Bal­lad of Sad Men for flute, then The Case of the Mys­te­ri­ous Glaxo Blue for two pianos — until he arrives at “the strangest of all cas­es”, in which he him­self becomes the pro­tag­o­nist of a sto­ry that is not only a crime sto­ry but a love sto­ry too.

Sev­en musi­cians, across sev­en short episodes, search here for the answer to that ques­tion. They encounter a man-bird, a run­ning detec­tive, an anony­mous clar­inet voice, and a string quar­tet in a dis­po­si­tion inspired by Mes­si­aen’s Quar­tet for the End of Time — a sub­tle nod in his direc­tion.
In the finale the work returns to a quo­ta­tion from Son­nant by my teacher Stanko Hor­vat — and fades in the high, almost weight­less pizzi­catos of the viola.

(Berislav Šipuš)

Can­tus Bio: 
Dur­ing almost 20 years of their exis­tence, soloists, con­duc­tors, con­cert halls, fes­ti­vals, con­ti­nents, com­posers, scores and con­cepts changed but not their spir­i­tu­al plat­form – the recent 20th and the cur­rent 21st-cen­tu­ry music. The milieu from which the Music Bien­nale Zagreb (MBZ) – as the Ensem­ble’s pro­gram and con­cep­tu­al nucle­us – stemmed, had, inter­est­ing­ly, nev­er seri­ous­ly con­sid­ered found­ing an insti­tu­tion­al­ized ensem­ble that would sup­port and con­tin­ue its uncon­ven­tion­al, and some­times even avant-garde pulse between the fes­ti­vals. It is pos­si­ble that in the musi­cal abun­dance of the 1980s it was enough to hear the con­tem­po­rary sound on stage once every two years, while dur­ing the war and post-war years there was no incen­tive for this ini­tia­tive. But there was in 2001 – Bien­nale was just around the cor­ner with a ready reper­toire, and Zagreb was full of expe­ri­enced (and young) musi­cians. For that par­tic­u­lar occa­sion, the tem­po­rary res­i­dent ensem­ble was estab­lished, but it was so won­der­ful­ly good that the MBZ’s spark lit the fire and the fate has bestowed on it per­ma­nence and sta­bil­i­ty. It stopped being mere­ly “tem­po­rary”, and a short while lat­er it took the name Can­tus (a Latin word for singing). Its mis­sion was set. They “… insist­ed on an approach in which the pre­sen­ta­tion of the occa­sion­al avant-garde music is not a goal in itself, but mere­ly the foun­da­tion on which inter­pre­ta­tion is built.” (Trpimir Mataso­vić, 2009).

Berislav Šipuš Bio: 

Berislav Šipuš (Zagreb, 1958) has direct­ed the Can­tus Ensem­ble since its found­ing in 2001.

Along­side study­ing art his­to­ry at the Fac­ul­ty of Human­i­ties and Social Sci­ences in Zagreb, he also stud­ied and grad­u­at­ed in com­po­si­tion at the Zagreb Acad­e­my of Music (1987, class of Stanko Hor­vat). He con­tin­ued his com­po­si­tion stud­ies with Gilbert Bosco in Udine and with François-Bernard Mâche and Ian­nis Xenakis at the UPIC Elec­tron­ic Stu­dio in Paris. He refined his con­duct­ing with Vladimir Kran­jče­vić, Željko Brkanović, Krešimir Šipuš, and with Milan Hor­vat at the Uni­ver­si­ty of Music and Per­form­ing Arts in Graz.

He was répéti­teur-pianist of the Bal­let of the Croa­t­ian Nation­al The­atre in Zagreb, a music the­o­ry teacher at the Elly Bašić Music School in Zagreb, répéti­teur-pianist of the Bermu­da Bal­let, and a pro­duc­er at the Vatroslav Lisin­s­ki Con­cert Hall. From 2001 to 2005 he was the direc­tor of the Zagreb Phil­har­mon­ic Orches­tra. He was pro­duc­er of the Music Bien­nale Zagreb and from 1997 to 2011 its artis­tic direc­tor. He lived in Milan and col­lab­o­rat­ed with Teatro alla Scala as répéti­teur-pianist for the Bal­let and Opera, assis­tant to con­duc­tors in the Opera, and orches­tral con­duc­tor in Bal­let productions.

He is a full pro­fes­sor at the Depart­ment of Com­po­si­tion and Music The­o­ry at the Zagreb Acad­e­my of Music and, since 2019, head of the department.

For his com­po­si­tions he has received a num­ber of nation­al and inter­na­tion­al awards, among them the Sev­en Sec­re­taries of SKOJ Award, Vjes­nik’s Josip Štol­cer Slaven­s­ki Award, and in 2004 the title of Cheva­lier of the Order of Arts and Let­ters from the Min­istry of Cul­ture of the Repub­lic of France. From Decem­ber 2011 he was Deputy Min­is­ter of Cul­ture, and from April 2015 to Jan­u­ary 2016 Min­is­ter of Cul­ture in the Gov­ern­ment of the Repub­lic of Croatia.

Dubravko Palanović Bio:

Com­pos­er and Dou­ble Bassist Dubravko Palanović (Zagreb, 1977) grad­u­at­ed in dou­ble bass in 1999 under Josip Novosel and in com­po­si­tion in 2008 under Željko Brkanović at the Zagreb Acad­e­my of Music.

He was a mem­ber of the renowned Gus­tav Mahler Youth Orches­tra under the direc­tion of Clau­dio Abba­do, and cur­rent­ly works pro­fes­sion­al­ly as a dou­ble bassist with the Zagreb Phil­har­mon­ic Orches­tra. He is also the founder of the ensem­ble Acoustic Project, in which he com­pos­es, arranges, and performs.

He has com­posed for promi­nent orches­tras and ensem­bles such as the Zagreb Phil­har­mon­ic, the Croa­t­ian Radiotele­vi­sion Sym­pho­ny Orches­tra, the Orches­tra and Choir of the Croa­t­ian Nation­al The­atre “Ivan pl. Zajc” in Rije­ka, the Salzburg Cham­ber Phil­har­mon­ic, the Moscow Sym­pho­ny Orches­tra, the Zagreb Soloists, the Can­tus Ensem­ble, the Zagreb Wind Ensem­ble, the Varaždin Cham­ber Orches­tra, and the Zadar Cham­ber Orchestra.

Among his sym­phon­ic works, notable pieces include: Con­cert Over­ture (2007), Ex Pro­fun­do Exi­tus (2008), In Medio Ignis (2014), Con­cer­to for Cel­lo and Orches­tra (2015), Sym­pho­ny “Bright Day” (2018), Suite ‘From Croa­t­ia’ (2018), and Tes­la (2023).

He has received numer­ous awards for his com­po­si­tions, includ­ing the 2nd Prize (1st not award­ed) at the Reinl-Stiftung Com­pe­ti­tion in Vien­na (2004) for Music for Strings and Marim­ba; the Award for Best Artis­tic Com­po­si­tion by a Croa­t­ian Author (2007) from the Vatroslav Lisin­s­ki Con­cert Hall for Con­cert Over­ture; the Rec­tor’s Award for Emphates for strings, per­formed at the Zagreb Music Bien­nale (2007); and 3rd Prize at the inter­na­tion­al com­po­si­tion com­pe­ti­tion “Mau­rice Rav­el” for Doloroso.

His works have been per­formed at fes­ti­vals such as the ISCM World Music Days, the Zagreb Music Bien­nale, the Osor Musi­cal Evenings, and Moscow Autumn. His com­po­si­tions have been released on record­ings by the Zagreb Wind Ensem­ble, Papan­dop­u­lo Quar­tet, Zagreb Soloists, the Acoustic Project and Acoustic Project Strings ensem­bles, as well as on solo albums by flutists Danij Bošn­jak and Ana Batinica.

The ensem­ble Acoustic Project’s new album Furi­ous Dance (2022), active­ly pro­mot­ed on con­cert stages, is almost entire­ly com­posed of his works.
At the end of 2023, his first autho­r­i­al album was released by the label Can­tus, fea­tur­ing six com­po­si­tions writ­ten over the past decade, includ­ing the Con­cer­to for Cel­lo and Orches­tra with Petra Kovačić on cel­lo and Alan Bjelin­s­ki as con­duc­tor. For the Zagreb Phil­har­mon­ic, he also cre­at­ed two music-the­atre works for chil­dren in col­lab­o­ra­tion with direc­tor Petra Radin: The Frosty Ones (2013) and Christ­mas with the Frosty Ones (2019).

Can­tus Ensemble: 

Berislav Šipuš, con­duc­tor, artis­tic director

Teo Devčić vio­lin

Tvrtko Pavlin vio­la

Jasen Chelfi cel­lo

Ana Batini­ca flute

Iva Ledenko oboe

Dani­jel Mar­ti­nović clar­inet 

Sre­bren­ka Pol­jak piano 

Fran Krsto Šercer per­cus­sion 

Pro­gramme: 

Ivan Josip Skender: Five Sketch­es for Three

Dubravko Palanović (world premiere)

Ante Knešau­rek: On a Moment of Loneliness

Żane­ta Rydzews­ka (world premiere)

San­da Majurec: I ritorni

Berislav Šipuš: Dick Tra­cy and the Most Pecu­liar Case of All – Falling in Love

Pro­gramme notes: 

• San­da Majurec: I ritorni

The com­po­si­tion I ritorni, for flute, clar­inet, vio­lin, piano, and cel­lo, was writ­ten in 2013. For­mal­ly, it is based on the ritor­nel­lo form: both on a glob­al lev­el, in the rela­tion­ships between the move­ments, and with­in each of the five move­ments, which are all com­posed as ritornellos.

The ensem­ble Glazbene staze pre­miered the piece in 2014, and in 2016 it was per­formed at the Glazbe­na trib­i­na in Opati­ja (by the mdi ensem­ble) as well as at the Uni­ver­si­ty of Music and Per­form­ing Arts Vien­na as part of the Fes­ti­val of Croa­t­ian Music in Vien­na and the project Women Com­posers from Slove­nia, Croa­t­ia, Mace­do­nia, and Ser­bia (2016).

The com­po­si­tion has also been per­formed by the Quasars Ensem­ble, and the Can­tus Ensem­ble has pre­sent­ed it in Zagreb, Vien­na, and Cologne.

Ante Knešau­rek: On a Moment of Loneliness

Svatko tko stvara mis­lim da je isku­sio samoću pa i trenu­tak usaml­jenos­ti koji pro­dublju­je vri­jeme i nemilod­srd­no širi nje­gove granice. Na neko nas vri­jeme taj trenu­tak usaml­jenos­ti čini bespomioćn­im. Korak pre­ma izlasku iz labir­in­ta samoće i hrabrost suoča­van­ja snjom jest barem korak pre­ma “novom”

Ivan Josip Skender: Five Sketch­es for Three

The com­po­si­tion “Five Sketch­es” was cre­at­ed in 2015. It was com­mis­sioned by my long-time col­lab­o­ra­tors, sis­ters Zita and Nadia Var­ga, and writ­ten for piano, clar­inet, and cel­lo. In the mean­time, the piece has been per­formed sev­er­al times by var­i­ous ensem­bles, includ­ing in a ver­sion for piano, clar­inet, and vio­la. The com­po­si­tion con­sists of five move­ments of dif­fer­ent char­ac­ters and dura­tions, which per­form­ers may play in any order, depend­ing on the atmos­phere they wish to cre­ate – or sim­ply as they prefer.

Berislav Šipuš: Dick Tra­cy and the Most Pecu­liar Case of All – Falling in Love

Dick Tra­cy and the Most Pecu­liar Case of All – Falling in Love, for 7 musi­cians, is the fifth com­po­si­tion in the cycle Dick Tra­cy…. Like the cycle Tan Het­ti, of which 3 have been com­plet­ed so far (besides the open­ing com­po­si­tion there are also Tin Hat­ti and Ten Hot­ti, and at least one of the two pieces from that cycle is wait­ing to be fin­ished and includ­ed in the cycle because I plan to have 5 and one day per­form them all togeth­er on the same evening).

Like some of Hin­demith’s Kam­mer­musik, that cycle of mine also deals with the prob­lems of CHAMBER SOUND, in com­bi­na­tions that touch on COLOUR, then FORM, it also deals with the expe­ri­ences and ele­ments of MUSIC THEATRE, and some­times tries to remain in the area of ABSOLUTE MUSIC.

Dick Tra­cy for solo piano, to my teacher Stanko Hor­vat, is a much more inti­mate cycle, main­ly because it deals with the per­son­al prob­lems of the main pro­tag­o­nist as well as the prob­lems of his clients… which he had not at all thought about or even IMAGINED but dis­cov­ers along the way, untan­gling one big and tan­gled ball of ques­tions and rid­dles, which thus grad­u­al­ly opens up before him, before us…

Up to now Dick Tra­cy has been solv­ing the cas­es of Pret­ty Pieta with the help of the bass clar­inet, then the mys­tery of The Bal­lad of Sad Men play­ing the flute, then he sat at even two pianos and tried to solve The Case of the Mys­te­ri­ous Glaxo Blue, and in the next instal­ment of the strangest case of all, that is the one in which the pro­tag­o­nist him­self feels that this time it is not only a crime sto­ry but also a love sto­ry… And those sto­ries are almost always unsolv­able riddles…

This time 7 musi­cians, through 7 short episodes, are look­ing for the answer to that ques­tion. On the way they will meet a man/bird, at the very begin­ning of the “case” (it is a self-quo­ta­tion because the pic­co­lo plays an ele­ment of the main motif from my com­po­si­tion E sar­rai sola sul lago for orches­tra)… Then fol­lows the “walk/run” of the detec­tive when all sorts of things can be dis­cov­ered… or not… The walk/run motif per­formed by a pair of cym­bals comes from the first com­po­si­tion of this cycle, and the har­mon­ic ver­ti­cal is made up of com­bi­na­tions of two sixths (seen before!), which can­not at all man­age to find their “con­so­nance”?!

The third part intro­duces a new char­ac­ter on stage — the clar­inet… a calm and some­what anony­mous line from which we will hard­ly learn any­thing… The inter­rup­tion of the search will be realised in the fourth episode by three string instru­ments, per­form­ing a com­plete­ly new and for­eign mate­r­i­al; it will appear now and nev­er again! But behind them some­one will “lag” — the vio­lin, after whose line the piano and the clar­inet will also “devel­op” their mate­ri­als and with­out inter­rup­tion lead us into episode no. 6 which bears the title Qua­touor – Quar­tet; the dis­po­si­tion of the instru­ments is as in Mes­si­aen and his Quar­tet for the End of Time. Nat­u­ral­ly it is an homage… “four char­ac­ters in search of…”? Per­haps for the peace of a chord will the com­po­si­tion also end, and around it cir­cle the sounds of the piano, with a real quo­ta­tion from the com­po­si­tion SONNANT for solo piano of my teacher Stanko Hor­vat. Then fol­lows the sprint of Dick Tra­cy per­formed by the flute, and final­ly the “spec­tral” echoes of every­thing in high, some­times strong, and some­times inaudi­ble pizzi­ca­to tones of the viola…

(Berislav Šipuš)