Musicologica Brunensia (Mar 2014)
Mikrotonální Hába: pět poznámek k Hábovu kompozičnímu stylu
Abstract
The article is a critical interpretation of selected microtonal compositions of the Czech composer Alois Hába. The author focused his attention on the chamber and choral compositions opp. 7, 10, 27, 31, 43, 72. In the general perspective of music history, Alois Hába is usually characterised as one of the leading protagonists of the Central European inter-war avant-garde that moved between Vienna, Berlin and Prague. In the specific context of Czech music he likewise has the reputation of an exemplary innovator but is considered to have been strongly rooted in tradition as well. Hába is known primarily as a tireless propagator of microtonal and athematic music, for which his own term was "liberated music". In this music he added more subtle quarter-, fifth- and sixth-tone intervals to the semitone system and abandoned up traditional treatment of motifs. These mere assertions, however, do not of themselves have any precise content and in fact problematize any proper conception of Hába's music; for example, pieces composed with microtones in fact represent less than a third of Hába's output as a composer.
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