The article examines the historical and political location of Galicia and the specificity of its cultural environment. The peculiarities of the musical life of the Galician city Kraków at the end of the 19th and the first half of the 20th centuries were noted. The predominance of the Catholic faith in «Polish Rome» is noted. The activities of musical educational institutions and musical societies, which held classes in choral singing and playing the organ, were noted. The church and musical life of the Roman Catholic population of Kraków at the end of the 19th and the first half of the 20th centuries is highlighted. New for liturgical musicology was getting to know the educational process in teachers' seminaries and in the Krakow Theological Seminary, where a men's choir, a string quartet and an orchestra operated. Much attention is paid to women's and men's monasteries, whose activities significantly influenced the development of church performance. In particular, a number of teaching aids were presented, attention was paid to the mastery of the brothers and sisters in choral, classical one- and two-part and polyphonic singing. The textbooks used to study Gregorian monody are noted and several nuns who became authors of sacred music are noted. The article reveals for the first time the most important schools attached to monasteries and their music groups. Data on the emergence of the Academic Choir and singing societies «Sokil», «Lute», «Haslo», «Worker's Lute», «Symphony», and the Society of Municipal Scribes, which cultivated church Roman Catholic music, were systematized. Particularly interesting are the facts about the combination of church and secular activities of the men's choir «Haslo» and «Cracow Lute». The repertoire of the leading groups and concert programs are also indicated, forming a holistic view of the church and musical life of Kraków at the end of the 19th – the first half of the 20th centuries.