Milan Mihajlović (1945) earned BA degrees in composition and conducting (S. Rajičić and Ž. Zdravković, 1970) and an MA degree in composition (S. Rajičić, 1978) at the Academy of Music in Belgrade; he was further educated at summer courses in Cologne and Salzburg. He taught subjects in music theory at the Faculty of Music (from 1975); then he was promoted to full professorship at the Faculty of Music in Belgrade and the Academy of Arts in Novi Sad. He was a co-founder of the Ensemble for Contemporary Music, director of the International Review of Composers (1992–2002), and president of the Composers’ Association of Serbia (1978–2002).
Mihajlović has won numerous awards for his works: the Stevan Hristić Award (1970), the BEMUS Award (1972), the October Prize of the City of Belgrade (1984), two first prizes at the International Review of Composers (in 1992 and 1996), the Mokranjac Award (1994), and the April Award of the City of Belgrade (2003). His works are often performed at home and abroad, across Europe, in America and Australia, at venues such as the Tonhalle in Zurich, Carnegie Hall in New York, the hall of the Berlin Philharmonic, Steinway Hall in London, and others, attracting the attention of first-rate musicians. In 2018, Howard Griffits recorded Mihajlović’s original CD (CPO) with the Brandenburg State Orchestra and held a concert with Mihajlović’s works in Frankfurt an der Oder.
Major works by Milan Mihajlović include the following: orchestra works Preludio, Aria e Finale (1972 – published by Edition Peters, Leipzig), Simfonijske metamorfoze (Symphonic Metamorphoses, 1977), Bagatele (Bagatelles, 1986) for violin, string orchestra, and harpsichord, Elegija (Elegy, 1989) for string orchestra, Memento (1993) for symphony orchestra, Silenzio (1996) for women’s choir and chamber orchestra, Povratak (The Return, 2002) for violoncello and symphony orchestra, Senke snova i mora (Shadows of Dreams and the Sea, 2011) for female choir and orchestra, and Fa-mi(ly) (2013) for piano and string orchestra; chamber pieces Lamentoso for clarinet, violin, and piano (1977), Notturni for French horn, wind and string quartet (1983), Mala žalobna muzika (Little Funeral Music, 1990), Tri prelida (Three Preludes, 1986–1989) for piano, and Zeleni talasi (Green Waves, 2009) for four harps. His composition In Praise of Solitude for English Horn and Orchestra (2019) is dedicated to the victims of the pandemic.
About the piece
In 2018, I was invited as a residential composer by the Festival of Contemporary Music in Dijon. At each of the five concerts, during the Festival, along with the works of contemporary composers from the Balkans, my works were also performed. I chose four compositions, in agreement with the performers, from my previous work, while the fifth was a special order of the Festival. I wrote Les Adieux for violin and piano, whose title is associated with the famous Beethoven sonata and whose two bars I used as thematic material. Beethoven dedicated this work to Archduke Rudolf, his patron, who left the city in fear of Napoleon’s army. This was also a specific message to the French, which, of course, no one understood. This is the first performance of Les Adieux in Serbia, in a shortened version.