Vladimir Tosic (b.Belgrade), composer, multimedia artist, professor at the Faculty of Music in Belgrade teaching counterpoint, harmony and musical forms. He graduated as a composer from the same faculty in the class of  Vasilije Mokranjac.

Artistic work:

Vladimir Tosic appeared as an author while still studying at concerts in his country (Belgrade, Zagreb, Ljubljana) as well as abroad (France, Hungary, Italy, USA). Of all the significant concert appearances the following can be singled out: a number of recitals in Belgrade, Novi Sad, Zagreb, 1978-1994; three appearances at the Zagreb Musical Biennial (1983-1987) and abroad at the Festival of Experimental  Music in Bourges (France 1982) and the New Music and Art Festival in Bowling  Green (Ohio, USA  1987, 2000); Festival Musica Nova Sao Paulo (Brasil 2000, 2001), New Music Miami Festival (2002), Spaziomusica Festival, Sardegna (Italy, 2003), II International Festival of Contemporary Music, Lima (Peru, 2004)...

Tosic won first prize at the composition competition Thomas Bloch (Paris, 2000).

In addition to composing, Vladimir Tosic started very early to perform both his compositions and the works or other modern composers. In this respect he was co-founder and member of the group of authors and performers called OPUS 4 as well as the Ensemble for Different New Music.

Stylistic orientation:

The basic approach in his artistic endeavour is the reductionistic principle of composing. All his pieces are based on particularly small number or various elements, sometimes even a single one (timbre, rhythm,  harmony...). One of the essential and remarkable characteristics of the creative work of Vladimir Tosic is the processual organization. Thus his composition is created by a gradual development or the initial core with the use of a chosen procedure and no abrupt changes or clashes or  different musical materials. The sound  material is more often than not based on the tones of harmonic series   since it is both neutral and comprehensive prototype of sound. The compositions are mainly of a symmetrical arc form with a simultaneous rise and fall of the parametres. Therefore almost every composition of  Vladimir Tosic may be said to have certain significant and noticeable common characteristics:  

1.  processual organization

2. repetition

3. symmetrical arc form

4. insisting on timbre  

 

Multimedia:

Although Vladimir Tosic is predominantly a composer, his interests extend far beyond pure musical concentration. He has broadened the musical medium to a great extent by audio-visual, synaesthesia in the broadest sense of the word. Thus he has created a number of multi-media works of art: visual arts (musical graphics and objects), environment (Gallery sound), stage (Fusion  for eight walkers), conceptual (Aha), video projections, photographs, slides (Non/Possibility). In this respect Vladimir Tosic started the recitals of his works simultaneously with the exhibitions of corresponding  musical graphics (the Gallery and Hall of  Student Cultural Centre,  18 April l978), wich was followed by numerous collective and one-man exhibitions.

Theoretical work:

In addition to composing reductionistic  music, Vladimir Tosic explained and justified this general and aesthetic reductionistic procedure in his theoretical work  Reduction principles in the constitution of a musical piece (published in the journal Sound 3-4 1986). He is also interested in the problem of musical symmetry so he participated at the Third interdisciplinary symmetry congress and  exhibition in  Washington  in 1995 where  he read his paper Symmetry in music as personal expression. In the year 2001. Student Cultural Center from Belgrade publish book OPUS 4 documents, by Vladimir Tosic, about group composers/performers M. Draskovic, M. Lazarov, M. Savic and V. Tosic.

 

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