Jan Cikker, who was born in 1911 and died just over a year ago, was one of the leading composers of his native Slovakia, and his half-dozen operas retain a hold in the local repertory. He was far from parochial in outlook, however: they include settings of Dickens, Romain Rolland and—his most successful work—Tolstoy's Resurrection. There has been no opportunity to see if these words transplant; but some of the instrumental music suggests a sympathetic and intelligent musical personality, as well as one with deep roots. The latter are, of course, strong in the Slovak suite and the Variations; but there is an attractive freshness in the handling of the material without any false naivety. Cikker is no Janacek: he does not absorb his country's musical essentials into an original personal language, at any rate in these agreeable pieces, but he writes well and with an engaging directness.
The work entitled Reminiscences is rather different. Scored for five wind instruments and strings, it is a kind of musical and personal retrospective, making use in one place of a folk theme, in another suggesting a gentle inner reflectiveness, ending on a darker movement that culminates with a tense 'war' fugue. It is warm, unpretentious music, and could well find friends for a composer who erned much admiration and affection from his countrymen.'