Slavka Kopcakova

The matter of considering popular music as a phenomenon that in the 20th century, along with the penetration of mass-media and recording into music, has caused a complete change in listening habits. Together with innovations in compositional techniques, or better approaches to music production and performing practice, the possibilities of modifying sound, not only in connection to the author and performer but also to the listener, have arisen. A new type of listener as well as a new kind of listening demands scrutinization of issues connected to so-called adequate listening within adequate auditive situations. In the contribution the author, through historical connections, surveys developmental changes in listening. Parallelly, the author also takes into account issues of professional and lay participation in musical communication through current tendencies objectified in the deliberations of music aestheticians, scholars as well as authors.

The increase of noise in man’s environment is a characteristic of aural human culture of the 20th century. Its subsequent involvement in artistic culture is a natural consequence of these processes. At its beginnings, noise, hisses, distortions, and various, originally non-musical, sounds came to be the means of expansion of potential aesthetic qualities of art. In the paper, the presence of noise elements as means of expression in the contemporary musical-dramatic genre is considered. Their aesthetic effects in alternative theatre are analysed using examples of performances and workshops at the “Academic Prešov” festival.

In the presented paper attention is drawn to the so-far under-appreciated art history and aesthetic orientation of a multidimensional personality. Jan Albrecht embodies a ”personal unity“ in whom a performing musician, musicologist, aesthetician, renowned university teacher and musical impresario all came together. He was one of those personalities that formed future generations of artists, teachers and theoreticians in the second half of the 20th century. With his personal imprint, Albrecht shaped post-war musical culture in Slovakia. His theoretical legacy represents a very interesting yet so-far not sufficiently researched chapter of the history of aesthetic reflection on art issues or the history of music aesthetics in Slovakia. As a music aesthetician, Jan Albrecht was in the background for a long time; for that reason, our aim is mainly to point out the aesthetic dimension of his personality and also partially analyse its results.