Mapping Canada's Music: Selected Writings of Helmut Kallmann ed. by John Beckwith and Robin Elliott (review)

Abstract

Canada's Music: Selected Writings of Helmut Kallmann. Edited by John Beckwith and Robin Elliott. Waterloo, ON: Wilfrid Laurier University Press, 2013. [x, 281 p. ISBN 9781554588916. $59.99.] example, illustrations, list of writings, index. Whether or not it was the in tendon of the editors, Canada's Music, which pairs the writings of music scholar and librarian Helmut Kallmann with editorial commentary elucidating the significance and influence of his career, strongly suggests that Kallmann, more than any other figure, can be considered the architect of music history as a field of study (articles mentioned in this review are printed in the text). Nowhere is this bold claim stated explicitly, but the evidence is all there in the book (listed numerically, in homage to Kallmann the list-maker): 1. Pioneer. Kallmann was the first person to take the study of Canada's musical past seriously, pursue it passionately, and dedicate an entire career to it. His 1950 article as a Field for Research imagines a discipline that is important, interesting, and surprisingly large in scope, in an era when many would have assumed that there was neither the quantity nor quality of material to warrant a robust branch of learning. Ten years later (1960) he published A History of in Canada, 1534-1914, the first book of its kind (Toronto: University of Toronto Press, 1960). introduction to the History (included in this collection) describes the challenges of weaving historical details from a country as large and culturally diverse as Canada into one narrative, a task that no one had attempted up to that point. Another first was his role as first chief of the newly-established Division at Canada's National Library, described in The Division of the National Library: First Five Years. In this role he helped create the largest collection of musical Canadiana in the country. He then went on to become coeditor of the first encyclopedia for the field, Encyclopedia of in Canada (EMC) (2nd ed., Toronto: University of Toronto Press, 1992), a mammoth publication with some 3,000 entries, as detailed in The Making of a One-Country Encyclopedia: An Essay after an Encyclopedia. 2. Process and personality. Kallmann's methodical work habits and fastidious attention to detail shine through in all of his writings and make it clear drat it was not just what he did as a scholar and librarian that shaped a budding new area of research, but how he did it. His essays on specific works, organizations, performers, and composers all suggest a scholar who had a passion for facts and fact-finding (see Joseph Quesnel's Colo et Colinette. James Paton Clarke, Canada's First Mus.Bac, The Canadian League of Composers in the 1950s: Heroic Years, Music in Internment Camps and after World War II: John Newmark's Start on a Brilliant Canadian Career, and Franz Schubert in Canada: A Historical Survey of Performance, Appreciation, and Research). level of thoroughness and detail he is able to bring to obscure topics (e.g., the 1790 Quebec premiere of the first Canadian opera, Schubert performances in Canadian cities in the nineteenth century) is truly impressive, and set a high standard for those who would follow in his footsteps. Furthermore, his reflections on some of the major projects of his career (e.g., procuring materials fir archival collections, editing the EMC) demonstrate that he was equally painstaking in developing sound processes and procedures for his research to ensure quality, efficiency, consistency and user-friendliness. (see Musk Library Association Digs Up Our Musical Past, The Making of a One-Country Encyclopedia, Taking Stock of Canada's Composers from the 1920s to the Catalogue of Canadian Composers (1952), and Mapping Canada's Music: A Life's Task). In this role as project manager he again set a high bar both for quality and productivity for those who would follow him in similar endeavors. …