Stabat Mater for Soprano, Contralto and Strings

Zoran Novačić (Krapina, 1964), conductor and composer, took his degree in conducting at the Music Academy of Zagreb University in the class of Pavle Dešpalj, who also supervised his one year post graduate study in the university. He did additional studies in Munich and Vienna with Berislav Klobučar on a Lovro and Lilly Matačić Foundation scholarship. A number of works mark his composing oeuvre. The composition Stabat Mater for soprano, contralto and strings was written in 2007, first performed in 2009, in Zagreb, at the grand opening of the Passion Heritage Festival. That same year, the composition was a prize winner at the 5th Triennial Competition for a composition inspired by the material of the Passion. On the occasion of the first performance, the composer wrote as follows: “The mystical triplet of the 13th century known under the title Stabat Mater has inspired composer after composer for centuries. Their artistic worth and beauty have in turn inspired me. I confided my work to instruments that can the best express deep emotion – the strings and the human voice. In the working of the text I used mainly old compositional techniques that helped me to convey vividly the suffering of Christ’s Mother. The composition contains twelve movements. In the first movement, above a rhythmical pattern repeated many times, the alto and soprano are tenderly interwoven, and with their calm song they take us off far into the past, to the hill of Golgotha. So begins the dirge...”