About the Society

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The Society of Slovene Composers (DSS) is a voluntary professional association of composers and musicologists. It had been founded on December 22, 1945.

BRIEF HISTORY

Before the Society came into existence, Slovene composers only sporadically joined forces in smaller, more or less organized groupings. The performances and the publishing of their works were taken care of by important cultural institutions and music magazines: Glasbena matica (1872-1945), Novi akordi (“New Chords”, 1901-14), Pevec (“The Singer”, 1921-38), Zbori (“Choirs”, 1925-34) in Nova muzika (“New Music”, 1928).

In the beginning of the Thirties of the 20th century a few composers, among them Slavko Osterc, became members of the International Society of Contemporary Music (ISCM) and started working  systematically on promoting Slovene composers and protecting their rights. The founding of the Society opened up significant new opportunities for Slovene composers: the Society started out by organizing public performances, then in 1954 it widened its field of activity by incorporating a publishing section (Edicije DSS) and establishing contacts with other European publishing houses. From 1966 onwards the Society issued its own publication: the DSS Bulletin.

Since 1991 the Society of Slovene Composers has functioned as an independent formation. Currently the Society counts 114 members. Under its wings, individual sections take care of different music genres: the section for church music (1999),  the Young Composers’ Club (2000),  the section for jazz and popular music (2001), the section for choral music (2001), the section for music in teaching (2002) and – last but not least – the section for electro-acoustic music (2002).

SO FAR PRESIDENTS OF THE SOCIETY WERE

Karol Pahor, Matija Bravničar, Vilko Ukmar, Danilo Švara, Uroš Krek, Dane Škerl, Bojan Adamič, Pavel Mihelčič, Janez Gregorc, Marko Mihevc, Jani Golob and Tomaž Habe

The activities of the Society are kindly subsidised by the Ministry of Culture of the Republic of Slovenia and are further made possible with financial contributions of the City of Ljubljana Municipaliy, SAZAS - Performing Rights Association of Composers, Authors and Publishers, Radio Slovenia and Pleško Printing House.