Георги Байданов и развитието на българското музикално образование в края на XIX и началото на XX век
Georgi Baydanov and the Development of Bulgarian Music Education at the End of the 19th and the Beginning of the 20th Century

Summary/Abstract: Georgi Baydanov’s (1853 – 1927) multifaceted activity played a significant role in the development of music education in our country. In 1890, he published the “Short Textbook of Music for the Lower Forms of Secondary Schools”, in which he combined ideas from the then latest works in the field of theory, solfeggio, and music education that had appeared during the second half of the 19th century. He wrote extensively for periodicals and was the editor of the first (and only) issue of “Gusla” – the earliest Bulgarian music magazine, published in 1891. Baydanov is also one of our choir pioneers, who conducted secular and church choirs. He actively participated in the organizational development of our musical culture at the turn of the century – he, alongside Dimitar Hadjigeorgiev, founded the “Kaval Musical Society” in the city of Stara Zagora in 1897. He was also involved in the activities of the Bulgarian Musical Union, established in 1904. Regardless of his indisputable role in developing music-educational views and accumulating music-theoretical ideas at that early stage, his work has not yet been the subject of a separate, larger-scale study. Most information about his life is provided in an article about Baydanov in the Encyclopaedia of Bulgarian Musical Culture [Krastev, 1967]. Dimo Boychev’s testimonies, published in Rodna Pesen Magazine [Boychev, 1942], are also valuable, while newer (predominantly journalistic) texts mainly reiterate what is already known. His personal archival collection, kept in the Science Archive of BAS (the Bulgarian Academy of Sciences), has been understudied, too. The purpose of this text is to update the data on Georgi Baydanov (biographical included) and to comprehensively interpret his educational contribution to the development of our musical culture and education.

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