Classical Music of Serbia

Composer and musicologist Stevan Stojanvic Mokranjac is seen as one of the very prominent initiators of current Serbian music. He was born in the year 1856, Mokranjac taught music, collected Serbian folk songs and he did his first scholarly research work on Serbian music. He was also the director of the first Serbian School of Music and he is one of the initiators of the Union of Singing societies. His most popular compositions are the Song Wreaths.

source of picture: music.indiana.edu 

During in the 19^th and 20^th centuries many ensembles, both the civilian and military, assisted to the establishment of music culture in Belgrade and other Serbian towns and cities. Earlier to Mokranjac’s period, Serbia’s representatives of the romantic era were world-popular violinist known as Dragomir Krancevic in the year 1874 to 1929, pianist Sidonija llic, Pianist and composer Jovanka Stojkovic and opera singer Sofija Sedmakov who attained achievement performing in opera houses of Germany in the 1890s. For instance, the path show custom was the first initiated by the Serbian Prince band established in the year 1831, and it was first conducted by Joseph Shlezinger, who composed music for the ensemble based on folk Serbian songs. This was during the period when the first choral societies, then extremely sung in German and Italian dialect, were being organized. And later also the first Serbian language compositions for choirs were written by Kormelije Stankovic.

Miloje Milojevic, Stevan Hristic, and Petar Konjovic were the Serbian composers, and all of them was born in 1880s, were the very well-known composers of their generation. They held the national expression and renovated the romanticism into the way of impressionism.

The well-known composer born around the 1910 studied in Europe, mostly in Prague. Ljubica Maric, Milan Ristic, Stanojlo Rajicic took influence from Schoenberg, Hindemith and Haba, rejecting the conservative composition of prior Serbian composers, seeing it as old fashioned and the wish for the national expression was outside their interest. And other popular classical Serbian composers include Josif Marinkovic, Isidor Bajic and Stanislav Binicki.