Page 400 - Weiss, Jernej, ur./ed. 2023. Glasbena društva v dolgem 19. stoletju: med ljubiteljsko in profesionalno kulturo ▪︎ Music societies in the long 19th century: Between amateur and professional culture. Koper/Ljubljana: Založba Univerze na Primorskem in Festival Ljubljana. Studia musicologica Labacensia, 6
P. 400
glasbena društva v dolgem 19. stoletju: med ljubiteljsko in profesionalno kulturo
him who succeeded in illuminating certain sections of Gallus’s work from
motets, masses, and moralia. One of the first to draw attention to the im-
portance of Gallus as one of the giants of late Renaissance music was Ka-
milo Mašek, a descendant of a Czech family of musicians active in Slovenia.
As the son of the great musicians Gašpar and Amalija Mašek, two other im-
portant Czech musical migrants to Slovenia,3 their only child Kamilo was
born with a musical education. Mašek not only succeeded in raising the le-
vel of musical creation in Slovenia with his songs, which, as Manica Špen-
dal writes, are “clearly superior in terms of expression and artistic value”4
to those of his contemporaries working in Slovenia, but it is also thanks to
him that the memory of Gallus’s legacy was revived for the first time. Only
a year before his untimely death, Kamilo Mašek published two short arti-
cles about Gallus. In them, he presented some biographical sketches from
the life of the “berühmter Kirchen-Tondichter” Jacobus Gallus in Cäcilija,
Slovenia’s first music magazine.5 Since the magazine was primarily inten-
ded for “Landorganisten Schullehrer,” the compositions by Gallus are un-
derstandably missing.6
Despite the initial enthusiasm, Mašek’s 1857 contribution did not elicit
any significant creative response from Slovenian cultural institutions. This
was probably also due to the fact that society life in this country was still
in its infancy in the mid-19th century in Slovenia and there was therefore a
lack of quality vocal ensembles capable of performing such a demanding
repertoire as that of Gallus. It was not until the beginning of the 1860s that
reading rooms were set up in all the larger towns in Slovenia, following the
ty of Ljubljana for a few years and at the music conservatory from 1920. He has pub-
lished widely on art history, archaeology, and history of music. In 1917 and 1918 he
was president of Glasbena matica and on the occasion of the 60th anniversary of the
Society he prepared an extensive historical exhibition on the Development of music
among Slovenes in the Narodni dom. At the time, he received a state award for his
work with Glasbena matica. Nataša Cigoj Krstulović, Zgodovina, spomin, dedišči
na: ljubljanska Glasbena matica do konca druge svetovne vojne (Ljubljana: Založba
ZRC, 2015), 102.
3 Jernej Weiss, Češki glasbeniki v 19. in na začetku 20. stoletja na Slovenskem (Maribor:
Litera and University of Maribor, 2012), 107–8.
4 Manica Špendal, “Značilnosti samospevov Kamila Maška,” Muzikološki zbornik 12
(1976): 49, http://www.dlib.si/?URN=URN:NBN:SI:doc-D8BQKJSU.
5 Kamilo Mašek, “Biografische Skizzen berühmter Kirchen-Tondichter. I. Jacobus Gal-
lus,” Cäcilia 1, no. 5 (1858): 34, http://www.dlib.si/?URN=URN:NBN:SI:DOC-WDX-
M3C3J.
6 Cäcilia. Musikalische Monatshefte für Landorganisten Schullehrer und Bedförderer
der Tonkunst auf dem Lande. Ibid.
398
him who succeeded in illuminating certain sections of Gallus’s work from
motets, masses, and moralia. One of the first to draw attention to the im-
portance of Gallus as one of the giants of late Renaissance music was Ka-
milo Mašek, a descendant of a Czech family of musicians active in Slovenia.
As the son of the great musicians Gašpar and Amalija Mašek, two other im-
portant Czech musical migrants to Slovenia,3 their only child Kamilo was
born with a musical education. Mašek not only succeeded in raising the le-
vel of musical creation in Slovenia with his songs, which, as Manica Špen-
dal writes, are “clearly superior in terms of expression and artistic value”4
to those of his contemporaries working in Slovenia, but it is also thanks to
him that the memory of Gallus’s legacy was revived for the first time. Only
a year before his untimely death, Kamilo Mašek published two short arti-
cles about Gallus. In them, he presented some biographical sketches from
the life of the “berühmter Kirchen-Tondichter” Jacobus Gallus in Cäcilija,
Slovenia’s first music magazine.5 Since the magazine was primarily inten-
ded for “Landorganisten Schullehrer,” the compositions by Gallus are un-
derstandably missing.6
Despite the initial enthusiasm, Mašek’s 1857 contribution did not elicit
any significant creative response from Slovenian cultural institutions. This
was probably also due to the fact that society life in this country was still
in its infancy in the mid-19th century in Slovenia and there was therefore a
lack of quality vocal ensembles capable of performing such a demanding
repertoire as that of Gallus. It was not until the beginning of the 1860s that
reading rooms were set up in all the larger towns in Slovenia, following the
ty of Ljubljana for a few years and at the music conservatory from 1920. He has pub-
lished widely on art history, archaeology, and history of music. In 1917 and 1918 he
was president of Glasbena matica and on the occasion of the 60th anniversary of the
Society he prepared an extensive historical exhibition on the Development of music
among Slovenes in the Narodni dom. At the time, he received a state award for his
work with Glasbena matica. Nataša Cigoj Krstulović, Zgodovina, spomin, dedišči
na: ljubljanska Glasbena matica do konca druge svetovne vojne (Ljubljana: Založba
ZRC, 2015), 102.
3 Jernej Weiss, Češki glasbeniki v 19. in na začetku 20. stoletja na Slovenskem (Maribor:
Litera and University of Maribor, 2012), 107–8.
4 Manica Špendal, “Značilnosti samospevov Kamila Maška,” Muzikološki zbornik 12
(1976): 49, http://www.dlib.si/?URN=URN:NBN:SI:doc-D8BQKJSU.
5 Kamilo Mašek, “Biografische Skizzen berühmter Kirchen-Tondichter. I. Jacobus Gal-
lus,” Cäcilia 1, no. 5 (1858): 34, http://www.dlib.si/?URN=URN:NBN:SI:DOC-WDX-
M3C3J.
6 Cäcilia. Musikalische Monatshefte für Landorganisten Schullehrer und Bedförderer
der Tonkunst auf dem Lande. Ibid.
398
