Note From The Editor
Since 1 January, 2019, the journal Hudební věda has had a new publisher, the Institute of Art History, Czech Academy of Sciences (IAH/CAS). The journal, whose first issue appeared in 1964, has retained its profile as an academic quarterly. Its current volume has a new graphic design by Jan Šerých. In accord with its status as one of this country’s leading professional periodicals, Hudební věda will continue to focus its content on departments bringing texts concerned primarily with Bohemian studies, as well as on reviews of Czech and international literature, and reports on academic conferences and symposia. A newly added department will offer information about doctoral studies in music‑related fields at Czech institutions of higher learning, and another new section will be centered around ongoing and concluded habilitation and appointment proceedings. In its sum, this department providing information about the current developments at Czech academic institutions offering various study programmes in disciplines related to music, will bring continuously updated information about all subjects of research dealt with in doctoral studies, as well as about new successfully defended dissertations, subjects of habilitation theses and lectures delivered as part of habilitation and appointment proceedings.
From its 2019 volume the journal will be supplemented by an online electronic version with its own ISSN periodical publication identifier. Most of the articles, reviews and information items contained in the periodical’s printed issue will be accessible on the journal’s website in an alternative language version. This gradual introduction of the practice of parallel publication of texts in two language versions, typically coupling a text in one of the major languages in the printed issue with the same text in Czech in the electronic format, reflects the editors’ ambition to communicate the results of Bohemian musicological studies to scholarly readership on a global scale, while at the same time continuing to take care of the development of the Czech terminological tradition.
In collaboration with the IAH/CAS Musicological Library (formerly, until the end of 2018, the Library of the Musicological Cabinet of the Institute of Ethnology, Czech Academy of Sciences), the editorial staff will probe into further ways of increasing the presence of the journal’s printed version in the international library network, e.g. through exchange of publications.
It is my pleasant duty to acknowledge here the financial and moral support, as well as the generosity and understanding extended to us by all the institutions whose contribution has made possible the continued publication of this journal: namely, the administration of the Institute of Art History, Czech Academy of Sciences, the Czech Ministry of Culture, and the Czech Music Fund. We also wish to thank the former and new members of the journal’s board of editors, whose expert advice, fresh impulses and critical comments will serve the editors as a crucial point of reference in their work.
In terms of expertise and workspace, the journal will rely on the facilities of the newly formed Department of Musicology of the IAH/CAS, which has been in operation since 1 January, 2019. Based on a selection process conducted between September and December 2018, as of 1 April, 2019, the Department of Musicology has been staffed by the following scholars: Roman Dykast (head of department and editor‑in‑chief of the journal Hudební věda), Anja Bunzel, Petr Daněk, Martin Horyna, Milada Jonášová, Václav Kapsa, and Aleš Opekar. At some point during the course of the current year, the department will be joined by Jana Vozková who was chosen in the selection process for the post of scholar in the Department of Musicology but is at the present time still engaged in the post of head of the IAH/CAS Musicological Library. The exact date of the termination of her position in the library has not yet been set. The IAH/CAS administration anticipates the transfer of Jana Vozková’s duties in the library, after the handover of the complete library agenda, to Markéta Kratochvílová – currently the curator of the library’s musical bibliography database – as its newly appointed head. In a separate selection process, Hana Jarolímková was chosen to become the copy editor of the journal Hudební věda. The long‑term concept of research conducted by the IAH/CAS Department of Musicology is centered around themes related to Bohemian studies in the field of history and theory of music. Thematic and operational interaction with other research centres within the IAH/CAS structure will be instrumentál in the implementation of the department’s principal team objective: namely, the publication of a collective monograph on The History of Music in the Czech Lands. Its preparation will proceed in a step‑by‑step process involving a series of partial subprojects. Their purpose will consist in charting the development of musical culture in the geographically and historically defined area that has been known as the Czech, or Bohemian Lands, and its interpretation from the perspective of the changing intellectual, social, cultural, economic, confesssional and institutional context, including its obvious connotations with the wider European scene.
The current membership of the research team makes possible the project’s covering of an adequately broad scope of study, ranging from the medieval period to the present time. The research will not be thematically limited to the sphere of high musical culture, but will rather endeavour to find new methods of discovering the impact of music in all strata of society during a given period. In the course of the project’s initial years, the research of medieval music will be focused on the production of monastic liturgical choral manuscripts of Bohemian/Czech provenance and on certain repertory‑related phenomena of the musical aspect of the Christian festive liturgy specific for the Bohemian context, aligning them with the corresponding developments documented by sources relevant notably to the Central European region. In the area of Renaissance music, the research will be focused primarily on the musical culture of Bohemia during the period before the battle of the White Mountain; its initial stage will be oriented towards the study of Rudolfian and pre‑White Mountain music printing. An important part of this research task will consist in the rediscovery and appraisal of Renaissance‑era music libraries on Bohemian/Czech territory, including most notably the library of the last members of the Rožmberk family. Research into the musical culture of the period before the battle of the White Mountain will include work on editions of polyphonic repertoire cultivated by the literary fraternities. A collective research subproject will consist in the preparation and continuous compilation of a Dictionary of Musical Culture in Bohemia in the Medieval and Renaissance Eras. A novel aspect of research into late‑Renaissance musical culture will be its inclusion of the theme of continuity or discontinuity of certain activities and phenomena in the development of musical culture during the early decades after the battle of the White Mountain. In chronological sequence, this will link up with research into the output of Prague‑based composers of the early 18th century, involving work on thematic catalogues of their production, and study of developments in music printing in this period. In the domain of secular music, the 18th century was characterized by numerous import of Italian operas of the time, a genre whose continued study will focus on specific aspects of Prague “teatro impresariale” (1724–1807, repertoire, impresarios, singers and reception by local audiences, exploring various sources including handwritten copies of scores and parts and printed librettos). Repertory overlaps from Italian opera to church music (contrafacta) will be examined through the study of arias and ensembles. Apart from partial studies of various aspects of the life and work of W. A. Mozart, due attention will likewise be devoted to analysis of the exceptional reception of his works in Bohemia in his time, along with its significant European connotations (including the European‑wide dissemination of Prague copies of Mozart scores). Research into musical culture of the 19th century will be focused primarily on the activities of music salons and societies of the time and their influence on the repertoire performed in those circles. In charting the development of popular musical culture, research will focus in its initial stage on the history of the Czech musical scene, and on documenting the evolutionary transformations of dance music and popular song production starting from the 18th century. It is expected that the current academic staff of the Department of Musicology will be gradually joined by scholars specializing in the study of music from the second half of the 19th century to the present time, and consequently the current list of research priorities will be updated to include topics relevant to this important period in the history of Czech musical culture.