Music of Slovakia

Other early instruments found include drums dating back to the Palaeolithic period, iron and bronze bells from the 3rd or 4th century AD.

[1] Other folk instruments of the region whose early development must remain largely conjectural include the fujara and the Slovak versions of bagpipes and the jaw harp.

[3][4] In 1526 when Slovakia became part of the empire of the Habsburgs, Bratislava became a coronation city, and this was to greatly influence the development of formal music in the country's towns.

In the larger towns, especially in Bratislava, the influence of the Italian concertante style was felt, composers in this vein including Samuel Capricornus (1628–1665) (who eventually became kapellmeister for a prince of Stuttgart), his successor at the Protestant church in Breatislava, Johann Sigismund Kusser (1626–1696).

A highly rated composer was František Xaver Budinský (1676–1727), who appears to have been a Jesuit lay brother and worked in Trnava, Prešov, Košice, Trenčín, and elsewhere in Slovakia.

In the first half of the 19th century, a national musical tradition began to develop around Slovakia’s impressive folk heritage.

A key figure who began this fusion is Ján Levoslav Bella, born in Liptovský Mikuláš (1843–1936), a contemporary of Antonín Dvořák and Leoš Janáček.