Church singing as a component of aesthetic education in the Tambov Theological Seminary in the late 19th – early 20th centuries

Abstract

At the turn of the 19th and 20th centuries, the Tambov Seminary was a spiritual and educational center that influenced the spiritual and other classes of society. In the 1850s and 1860s, musical education in religious educational institutions as a purposeful pedagogical process did not exist. Church singing lessons were conducted at a low level. Since 1884, the attitude towards the methods of spiritual and moral enrichment and development of the aesthetic culture of seminarians has changed in religious educational institutions: separate time was allocated in the schedule for teaching church singing, optional classes in icon painting and painting were introduced, instrumental classes appeared, and bans on visiting secular cultural institutions were significantly relaxed. The author of the article comes to the conclusion that during the period under study, the system of education in the theological seminary changed noticeably. Subjects of the aesthetic cycle constituted the initial stage of the formation of a new tradition. Church singing was introduced as a compulsory subject, and icon painting and instrumental classes were introduced as optional subjects. Thanks to the wonderful teachers of the Tambov Theological Seminary, the level of teaching of these subjects was quite high, as evidenced by the quality of singing during services, as well as the complex repertoire of the seminary choir, which was popular in the urban environment. It was music and musical training that played an ennobling role in the process of organizing the personal and collective life of seminarians.