ANNA PIOTROWSKA FOLKLORE AS A SOURCE OF NATIONAL IDENTIFICATION IN MUSIC

According to many scholars – especially those in favour of communication theo-ries –“a system based on musical laws alone, one that makes crystallization possible, is not only disconnected from extra musical laws but may well interfere with linkages between the two “worlds” ( Katz, Cohen,1993:94). Consequently, it is often assumed that music can actively influence the construction of aesthetic and discursive notions – one of the most influential being the concept of nationalism. In the scholarship of musicology the adaptation of the theory of nationalism in reference to musical com-position opened up new possibilities of interpreting these musical components na-tional music supposedly is made of. It is a common consensus among historians, sociologists and musicologists that the idea of nationalism –so fruitful in the history of music, especially since the 19th century – comprises a huge variety of elements, some altering in the course of time and developing along the progress of the idea itself, some remaining constant. Although the semantic interpretations of the very concept nation still vary among scholars, certain connotations promoted during the discussions of the nation and nationalism have always accompanied the discours