Vladimír Godár

“Godár's music brought in the early 1980s in Slovak context new “arguments” – the new postulation of musical time, a new attitude to the past, consisting in the adoption of historical formal concepts (passacaglia, concerto grosso, partita) and the new form of consequent serial thinking, where there is a crossroads of vertical (the principle of tonal center), linear (canonical principle) and sonic (cluster). These new stimuli were perceived as an entrance for a new generation of composers (M. Burlas, I. Szeghy, P. Breiner and others) as well as an aesthetic revolt against the “official” music of the 1970s and also against the persisting heritage of New Music. In a broader context, however, they were associated with deeper resources of European music manifesting in parallel in work of A. Schnittke, H. M. Górecki, G. Kancheli etc. Godár's compositions can be characterized by a combination of two fundamental assumptions: relatively short, terse motivic shapes, and dimensional space, on which shapes are implemented. In contrast to the minimalist approach, however, Godár's musical time goes in phases, it is warped by significant changes of compositional structure related with maximal dynamic contrast (Talizman, Sekvencia; Grave). At the turn of the 1980s and 1990s Godár emphasized coupling with historical periods, which manifested mostly in an associative level (Emmeleia; Barkarola; Déploration; Via lucis), and sometimes even in the very musical process (Ecce puer). The way in which Godár's music resonates in the Slovak movies deserves special attention (Neha / Tenderness; Všetko čo mám rád / Everything I Love; Cudzinci / Aliens; Záhrada / Garden; Orbis Pictus) shedding a new light on the question of the social isolation of the contemporary composer.”

(ZAGAR, Peter: Vladimír Godár. In: 100 slovenských skladateľov. Ed. Marián Jurík, Peter Zagar. Bratislava : Národné hudobné centrum, 1998, p. 105 – 106.)