Darko Petrinjak, notable Croatian guitarist and guitar pedagogue has been playing a prominent role in the production of guitar music repertoire in the last few decades. So, even though he has dedicated his recent CD to another music enthusiast, the year-long spiritus movens of the Osor Musical Evenings, Daniel Marušić (1931-2009), it is exactly Petrinjak who has been diligently motivating a number of Croatian contemporary composers, industriously encouraging the emergence of new pieces, by performing and recording them.
This is supported by the CD in front of us in the best possible way, since four out of five here recorded compositions were created in Petrinjak’s collaboration with Croatian composers, while Boris Papandopulo’s Dodecaphonic Study (from 1978) – although encouraged by the versatile activities of guitarist Marijan Makar – was first performed by Petrinjak in the Hall of the Luka Sorkočević Art School in Dubrovnik, on the 7th of May, 2007.
Thus, without any doubts, this release might as well also carry the title of the composition with which Petrinjak opens this newest selection of his – the piece Petrophonia by Nikša Njirić, because as much as this title substantially signifies Petrinjak’s active position in the emergence of new music pieces, it also reflects his own personal “soundscape” in which Croatian contemporary music takes a prominent place.
