The song of faith on the organ – the musical heritage of Karol Hławiczka and Adam Hławiczka

Abstract

The Hławiczka Brothers, Karol (1894-1976) and Adam (1908-1995), were composers and organists connected with Cieszyn Silesia. Their rich creative output covers organ pieces, a great majority of which used melodies taken from the Lutheran chorale. The way they treated musical themes originating from church songs is the main aspect touched on in the analyses of their compositions presented in this article. The Hławiczka brothers intentionally fit their works into the liturgical music trend, which had been present in the organ literature since the 15th century. Even though they primarily refer to the Romanticism, in many aspects their pieces bear resemblance to earlier musical styles.The present article is a documentation of the author’s previous studies on organ music in Cieszyn Silesia, especially works written by the Hławiczka brothers. The aim of these studies was to promote the little-known music of these Silesian composers among organists and to encourage performers to search for and discover forgotten sources of Polish music. The article outlines the historical and cultural context of that region, presents the biographies of both composers, discusses their organ compositions and – based on the performed analysis of selected works – it characterises the style features of each creator. The author relied solely on the currently available sheet music editions, which only contain selected pieces by these composers. Other variants of the already published pieces, which very likely exist in a form of manuscripts, as well as unpublished compositions provide a space for further discovery and analysis and perhaps – after re-editing music sheets – re-issuing the edition of organ pieces by the Hławiczka brothers, thanks to which their music would certainly gain more interest among performers.