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On Czech musical education.

Article Excerpt
In any country the quality of the music education system has a direct and long-term influence on the level of national musical life. And even today in a globalised world the notion of "national schools" of play on one instrument or another still makes some sense. Our magazine is mainly concerned with the results of composition and performance, but the precondition--the issue of music education--, is a crucially important problem. This article focuses on basic (elementary) music education, which has a remarkable institutional tradition in the Czech Republic.

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Historical Excursus

The conservatory of Europe--this was how one of the enthusiastic readers of the English traveller Charles Burney's Musical Travelogue of the 18th Century, which described the teaching of music in the Bohemian rural areas, flatteringly described Bohemia. The teaching of the arts, and especially music, does indeed have a strong and long tradition in Bohemia. Its origins can be dated right back to the 17th century. The teaching of music was the responsibility of cantors, i.e. teachers who had a secondary profession as musicians. They worked in places where there were orchestras and ensembles. They played for dances, listening, and entertainment and at the same time formed smaller orchestras of their pupils. These later became the basis for the chateau ensembles that developed a rich and vibrant musical culture, for example in Roudnice nad Labem, in Jaromerice nad Rokytnou, in Dolejsi Lukavec (today Dolni Lukavice) near Plzen, Namest' nad Oslavou and elsewhere. This world of the cantors represents an important chapter in Czech history, for it was the seedbed from which the whole music-making tradition of the 18th century sprang, and so a background that ultimately made possible the crowning achievements of Czech musicians in the 19th century. From the mid-19th century the development of education in the arts was organised along the lines laid down by the Imperial Decree no. 309 of the Imperial Law, of the 27th of April 1850. This was the...