V.F. Odoyevsky and public music education: the background of the problem and the reception of the scholar’s ideas in Russian folklore

Abstract

The author of the article thinks through the views of an outstanding writer, musician, scholar, collector and music folklore and the Old Russian art of singing researcher, Prince Vladimir Fyodorovich Odoyevsky on public music education. The author considers Odoyevsky’s opinion about the education of the lowest tiers of Russian society and female education and the possible ways of public music education. The research is based on Odoyevsky’s letters and diaries, and three articles about primary music education methods and the peculiarities of giving solfegio classes to broad public. The author focuses on the role of “numerical technique” in the development of Russian folklore music notating.The scientific novelty of the research consists in the understanding of Odoyevsky’s contribution to the popularization of the music notating system created by Émile-Joseph-Maurice Chevé. The author of the research is the first to establish Odoyevsky’s priority in developing and supporting government and social initiatives in the field of public music education. The author demonstrates the universal character of approaches of the Russian enlightener to solving educational problems and explains the reception of some scientific ideas of the scholar in Russian folklore milieu. The author uses the examples of typologically homogeneous terms of the theory of music applied by Odoyevsky and still used by folklore musicians.