Flashbacks – Insights – Outlooks

The Department of Folk Music Research and Ethnomusicology celebrates 50 years. Department head Ursula Hemetek provides insights into research emphases then and now.

By Ursula Hemetek

1965…

The mid-sixties witnessed major changes in Austrian research and higher education. It was the period during which art schools, formerly known as Kunstakademien, were reclassified as Hochschulen. In the area of folk music research, academy graduate Walter Deutsch (who had studied composition and music theory) had already made a name for himself; word of his specialised expertise spread, and he was ultimately appointed by the Academy of Music “as an instructor in 1963 and as a contract-instructor for ‘musical ethnology’ in 1964. So when the resolve solidified to turn this Akademie into a Musikhochschule with academic components under the Academy’s president Hans Sittner in 1965, the Department of Folk Music Research and Ethnomusicology was set up with Walter Deutsch as its head. The second department established back then was the Department of Music Sociology and Music Education Research, led by Kurt Blaukopf.” (Haid 2011)

The Department of Folk Music Research and Ethnomusicology

The cornerstones of this department’s further development were strongly linked with general changes at the Akademie / Musikhochschule / Universität. The importance of research work gradually grew, a fact also reflected in the establishment of additional research departments. The Department of Folk Music Research and Ethnomusicology was originally subordinated to that of Music Education before becoming a full-fledged department in its own right. Farther down the road, on 1 October 1998, the arts-oriented Hochschulen were renamed Kunstuniversitäten [arts universities], and the subsequent Austrian Universities Act of 2002 added doctoral studies, a step that was to be an important impetus for the development of a scholarly corporate identity at the mdw.

A Centre for Austrian Folk Music

In the beginning, work at the department adhered to the so-called “Viennese school” of folk music research, with scholarly work and curriculum content concentrating on vocal and instrumental folk music from Austria. The 1980s then saw Rudolf Pietsch establish research on instrumental folk music styles and practical approaches in teaching that have remained important to this day.

And in 1994, Gerlinde Haid took over leadership of the department upon her appointment. In a continuation of its previous work, the department cultivated a critical orientation toward cultural developments in society, thus successively expanding the fields of research covered and the spectrum of methods employed.

International Research Institution

A new thematic area that rose to prominence was the music of minorities. International cooperative relationships were intensified. And in 2001, Ursula Hemetek completed her habilitation thesis in ethnomusicology. Concurrently with passage of the Austrian Universities Act of 2002, the impact of all these developments could be seen in the addition of “Ethnomusicology” to the department’s name. 2003 saw the establishment of the Research Centre for European Polyphony (head: Ardian Ahmedaja). And the department, still led by Gerlinde Haid, proceeded to develop into an internationally recognised research institution. In 2007, the World Conference of the ICTM took place with the department as the lead participant. On 1 January 2011, Gerlinde Haid handed over leadership of the department to Ursula Hemetek, who was thus able to take over a well-tended field. And since 2012, Ulrich Morgenstern has held a tenured professorship for the history and theory of folk music.

50 Years of Research

The celebration planned to mark the department’s 50^th jubilee will attempt to do justice to its colourful and eventful history, portraying and reflecting upon a bit of what has been achieved over these past 50 years as well as that which remains to be done. Some of the department’s current staff members already belong to the third generation of researchers after Walter Deutsch—who will himself be on hand as a witness to the department’s history. The celebration’s programme items are meant to draw an arc across the generations and the diversity of themes, and—as is usual in the field research methods typical of this discipline—to involve views both from within and from without. Prominent foreign colleagues will be in attendance to provide the latter.

The programme will include musical contributions by students past and present, a film portrait of the department, and presentations of the most recent publications. And a core component, the result of intensive research on the part of all department staff, will be the exhibition 50 Years of the Department of Folk Music Research and Ethnomusicology. This presentation’s structure will reflect the department’s characteristics and the emphases of its work: teaching, theses and dissertations, field research, archival work, research projects, publications, cooperative projects and relationships, events, and of course a “tabula personae” featuring the individual protagonists of these areas.

The “Propinationes” in the afternoon—which will lead into a musical conclusion—will consist of formal toasts to a large number of “personae” from a wide range of areas linked with the department.

Please feel cordially invited to attend!

Thursday
8 Oct. 2015
50 Years of the Department of
Folk Music Research & Ethnomusicology
Jubliee Symposium and Celebration
Joseph Haydn Hall
Anton-von-Webern-Platz 1
1030 Vienna