Prerequisits:

There are no specific prerequisites. However, prior knowledge of basic theories and research methods in ethnology, anthropology, folklore studies, cultural heritage studies, or related fields—is recommended.

Content (Syllabus outline):

Images and scenes of everyday and special moments, vividly presented in the visual arts, are also frequently present and important in the heritage of (art) songs, in which lyrics especially come to life through music. The course focuses on musical representations of persons, objects, environments, and events of a particular time and place in selected repertoires of Early Western (primarily medieval) artistic musical heritage, ranging from written and oral traditions, between fixed record and improvisation, as well as within the framework of individual historical contexts and connections and various possibilities of performance practice. The theoretical part of the lectures and seminars aims to present the musical, textual, and historical context, providing the starting points for analysis and understanding of the content, as well as the theoretical application of this knowledge. In the practical part, students analyse the processes of creation and development of this type of musical heritage and, depending on the interests of each group, can also try it out for themselves in practice, since part of the lectures and seminars is also devoted to direct group performance.

The course is based on selected musical repertoires (I) of Gregorian and later liturgical chant, mainly from Slovenian territory (plainchant forms, liturgical function and content of chants, images of saints, modality, orality/written tradition, learning and memory, formulaicity and improvisation, rhetoric and text delivery, chant singing in male and female church institutions), and (II) Western medieval religious and secular songs (secular genres from the works of troubadours to minnesingers, Aquitanian versus and French conductus, connections with the Slovenian region, later polyphonic genres in which the earlier tradition is evident).

The course addresses important questions that arise in relation to these repertoires and can be applied to other musical repertoires and broader cultural phenomena in specific historical periods. These are: how images came to life in music; what the representational nature of music meant in a given period and what its function was; what was the role of the text and what was the role of music; how the representational power of music influenced its dissemination; how stereotypes of images develop in music; what is the role of the singer/performer in each case; what does the concept of music mean when applied to selected repertoires and how does this broaden our understanding of the concept of music and music history, etc. At the same time, the course strives to re-evaluate the concept of the “artistic value” of music as developed in the 19th century, which elevated instrumental music to the level of the purest art form, while rejecting any music that served a functional purpose as inferior, even though such music represents the foundations of European music history. Contemporary content in which the influence of many ideas from the texts of these repertoires is still recognisable will also be critically interwoven with the general content of the course and examined. The course will evaluate their “artistic” expression embodied in music, testifying to the hidden vitality and relevance of this musical heritage, which is almost unknown today.

Readings:

Monographs:

• Fassler, Margot. 2014. Music in the Medieval West. New York in/and London.
• Fontes, João Luís, Diana Martins, Catarina Fernandes Barreira, and Mário Farelo, ur./eds. 2024. An Embodied Religion: Materialities and Devotion in Medieval Europe. Berlin.
• Harper, John. 1991. The Forms and Orders of the Western Liturgy from the Tenth to the Eighteenth Century. Oxford.
• Harrán, Don. 1986. Word-tone Relation in Musical Thought: From Antiquity to the Seventeenth Century. Neuhausen – Stuttgart.
• Hoefener, Kristin. 2022. Kultgeschichte als Musikgeschichte: Untersuchungen zu Ursprung, Entwicklund und Verbreitung von Offizienzyklen zu Ehren der heiligen Kölner Jungrauen. Paderborn.
• Gossen, Nicoletta. 2006. Musik in Texten – Texte in Musik: Der poetische Text als Herausforderung an die Interpreten der Musik des Mittelalters.
• Leach, Elizabeth Eva, in/and Helen Deeming, ur./eds. 2024. Cultural History of Western Music in the Middle Ages. London.
• Snoj, Jurij in/and Gregor Pompe. 2003. Pisna podoba glasbe na Slovenskem. Ljubljana.
• Snoj, Jurij. 1999. Gregorijanski koral. Ljubljana.
• Snoj, Jurij, ur./ed. 2012. Zgodovina glasbe na Slovenskem I. Ljubljana.

Selected manuscript and printed sources as well as study materials brought by the lecturer.

• Izbrani članki v slovenski in tuji strokovni periodiki (po dogovoru). / Selected articles from international musicological journals.
• Izbrani zvočni posnetki v Naxos Music Library (Mrežnik NUK) in drugih bazah (po dogovoru). / Selected music recordings from Naxos Music Library and other databases.

Objectives and competences:

Specific course-related competences:

Students will learn about the socio-historical impulses for the creation and performance of selected repertoires of early vocal art music in Slovenia and Europe. The focus will be on the issue of the functionality vs. artistry of music of the styles and periods considered, and especially the ritual function of this music. This will enhance and broaden students’ perspectives on the role of artistic creation in society in general, which is also relevant to newer music. In the theoretical part of the course, students will improve their understanding of the interaction between text and music and their combined roles in the function of representation. In the practical part of the course, they will also obtain practical insight into certain creative procedures and performance practices.

General competences:

In doing so, they will master the interdisciplinary methodological procedures needed to study this issue and develop their analytical skills and the ability to independently seek out appropriate answers to selected specific questions and apply general and cultural-historical concepts to music history.

Intended learning outcomes:

Students will:

• prepare a written scholarly work from the field of study;
• acquire a theoretical and practical insight into the selected musical repertoires;
• be capable of critically and independently reflecting on the representational character of various musical genres;
• understand the connections between text and music within the musical genres studied; and
• know how to analyse the representational character of musical works from these repertoires and also apply this knowledge more broadly to other musical genres.

Learning and teaching methods:

Types of learning/teaching:

• Frontal teaching
• Work in smaller groups or pair work
• Independent students work
• e-learning

Teaching methods:

• Explanation
• Conversation/discussion/debate
• Work with texts
• Case studies
• Different presentation
• Inviting guests from companies

Assessment:

• Long written assignments (Seminar paper with scholarly apparatus) 80 %
• Presentations 20 %

Lecturer’s references:

• Šter, Katarina. »’Allora più gradito, che più battuto’: Franciscans from Koper and Their Baroque cantus fractus.« De musica disserenda 20/ 1- 2 (2024): 153–206. DOI: 3986/dmd20.1-2.07.
• Šter, Katarina. »Discubuit Iesus: Škof Tomaž Hren, Gornji Grad in slovenski koral.« [“Discubuit Iesus: Bishop Thomas Chrön, Gornji Grad and Slovenian Chant.”] Muzikološki zbornik 59/1–2 (2023): 153–194. DOI: 4312/mz.59.1-2.153-194. [C
• Šter, Katarina. “A Chant Treatise in the Service of Two Monastic Traditions of the Modern Era: The Case of the Musices Choralis Medulla.” Muzikološki zbornik 56/2 (2020): 153–181. DOI: 4312/mz.56.2.153-181.
• Šter, Katarina. “The ‘Prague Group’ of Music Manuscripts from the Charterhouses Žiče (Seitz) and Jurklošter (Geirach).” V/In: Sammeln, Kopieren, Verbreiten: Zur Buchkultur der Kartäuser gestern und heute, Analecta cartusiana 337, ur./ed. S. Excoffon in/and C. Zermatten, 491–510. Kartause Ittingen in/and Saint-Etienne: 2018.
• Šter, Katarina. »Kdo je Begunka pri zibeli: Nekaj misli ob Lajovčevem samospevu.« [“Who is the Refugee by the Cradle: Some thoughts on Lajovic’s song.”] Muzikološki zbornik 54/1 (2018): 31–48.
• Šter, Katarina. »Mary Magdalene, the Apostola of the Easter Morning: Changes in the Late Medieval Carthusian Office of St Mary Magdalene.« Muzikološki zbornik 53/1 (2017): 9–53