Musical Heritage of the Pereyaslav Collegium

Abstract

This article is an interdisciplinary study that aims to form a comprehensive view of music and church singing both in the educational process of collegium students and outside it. Thanks to the historical sources involved, we were able to clarify the mechanism of functioning of church singing both in the collegium and at the stage of primary (preparatory) education of future students, as well as its role in the life of collegium graduates who made careers in the major vocal chapel of the Russian Empire. The preparatory stage for the future students was studying in parish schools, where an obligatory discipline was irmoloinyi singing. It is probable that in the 18th century, the teaching of singing in the collegium was carried out in the primary classes, where Church Slavonic literacy was studied at the same time, and in the first years of the 19th century musical singing was officially reflected in the name of a separate class. All students of the collegium underwent compulsory liturgical singing practice. The most gifted of the students were members of the Episcopal Cathedral Vocal Chapel. The students of the collegium were not limited to singing only in the cathedral; they also sang during the festive processions, during the begging, as well as in the parish churches during the holidays, where they also taught church singing. Among the music books, we know for sure about several Irmologions that were used in the collegium. From the memoirs of an eyewitness of the first third of the 19th century, we learn about the singing of hymns during public exams, as well as the singing of vocal concerts during the traditional holiday greetings to the Bishop, Rector, and Prefect of the seminary. It was noted that this tradition existed in the last quarter of the 18th century. Such a practice did exist at the same time in Kyiv-Mohyla Academy, so this evidence seems plausible. The only evidence of the use of musical instruments among the students of the Pereyaslav Collegium comes from the descriptions of the May recreational festivities, when both vocal and instrumental ensembles from among the pupils were heard.