Page 408 - 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
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glasbena društva v dolgem 19. stoletju: med ljubiteljsko in profesionalno kulturo
toriography, namely the polarisation of society activities in Slovenia. Al-
though this polarisation is often portrayed mainly in the older music his-
tory literature,33 practical examples, on the contrary, show close links both
in performance and other areas. Czech musicians, with their good musi-
cal and technical skills and their prevailing cosmopolitanism, were the link
between the two societies. Despite the many stumbles of the champions of
one side and the other, let us only remember the confrontation with Foer-
ster in Alešovec’s Brencelj in 1880,34 they were strangers to radical struggle
for one side or the other. In the aforementioned article, Foerster was called
a foreigner who does not support Slovenian music, which is of course non-
sense of the first order. At least 16 of the best Slovenian authors were, as the
article says, unemployed, unlike the Czech Foerster. Interestingly, it was
the priests and monks of the Cecilian Society who reacted most strongly to
these completely unfounded, almost xenophobic statements and sent him a
letter of support in January of the same year. Among them was Jakob Aljaž,
who, as a student of Foerster, was of the opinion that this criticism was pri-
marily aimed at denigrating Foerster on a personal level.
Thus Foerster, Hoffmeister, and many other Czech musicians active in
Slovenia, together with some of the most prominent Slovenian intellectu-
als, undoubtedly including Josip Mantuani, managed to cross the Rubicon
of Slovenia’s obvious social-ideological division. Moreover, through their
self-sacrificing work, they contributed significantly to the qualitative im-
provement of the activities of almost all music associations in Slovenia and
thus to the gradual professionalisation of musical life. Moreover, by reviv-
ing Gallus’s heritage, they also succeeded in raising awareness of the tradi-
tion and continuity of artistic music in Slovenia.
33 Dragotin Cvetko, Slovenska glasba v evropskem prostoru (Ljubljana: Slovenska mati-
ca Ljubljana, 1991), 335.
34 Jakob Alešovec, “Razloček med Försterjem in Riharjem na šenklavškem koru,” Bren
celj 12, no. 1 (1880): 6, http://www.dlib.si/?URN=URN:NBN:SI:DOC-FUIVII5Y; Ja-
kob Aléšovec, “Pesem šenklavškega šomaštra,” Brencelj 12, no. 2 (1880): 5, http://
www.dlib.si/?URN=URN:NBN:SI:doc-SXRMUSJS.
406
toriography, namely the polarisation of society activities in Slovenia. Al-
though this polarisation is often portrayed mainly in the older music his-
tory literature,33 practical examples, on the contrary, show close links both
in performance and other areas. Czech musicians, with their good musi-
cal and technical skills and their prevailing cosmopolitanism, were the link
between the two societies. Despite the many stumbles of the champions of
one side and the other, let us only remember the confrontation with Foer-
ster in Alešovec’s Brencelj in 1880,34 they were strangers to radical struggle
for one side or the other. In the aforementioned article, Foerster was called
a foreigner who does not support Slovenian music, which is of course non-
sense of the first order. At least 16 of the best Slovenian authors were, as the
article says, unemployed, unlike the Czech Foerster. Interestingly, it was
the priests and monks of the Cecilian Society who reacted most strongly to
these completely unfounded, almost xenophobic statements and sent him a
letter of support in January of the same year. Among them was Jakob Aljaž,
who, as a student of Foerster, was of the opinion that this criticism was pri-
marily aimed at denigrating Foerster on a personal level.
Thus Foerster, Hoffmeister, and many other Czech musicians active in
Slovenia, together with some of the most prominent Slovenian intellectu-
als, undoubtedly including Josip Mantuani, managed to cross the Rubicon
of Slovenia’s obvious social-ideological division. Moreover, through their
self-sacrificing work, they contributed significantly to the qualitative im-
provement of the activities of almost all music associations in Slovenia and
thus to the gradual professionalisation of musical life. Moreover, by reviv-
ing Gallus’s heritage, they also succeeded in raising awareness of the tradi-
tion and continuity of artistic music in Slovenia.
33 Dragotin Cvetko, Slovenska glasba v evropskem prostoru (Ljubljana: Slovenska mati-
ca Ljubljana, 1991), 335.
34 Jakob Alešovec, “Razloček med Försterjem in Riharjem na šenklavškem koru,” Bren
celj 12, no. 1 (1880): 6, http://www.dlib.si/?URN=URN:NBN:SI:DOC-FUIVII5Y; Ja-
kob Aléšovec, “Pesem šenklavškega šomaštra,” Brencelj 12, no. 2 (1880): 5, http://
www.dlib.si/?URN=URN:NBN:SI:doc-SXRMUSJS.
406
