Maria Schildt

I am a senior lecturer at the Department of Musicology since 2016, and director of undergraduate studies. I teach principally within music history and my research deals with early modern European music. Since 2019/20 I am working within three research projects on music transfer in 17th-century Europe, 18th-century music collections and the historiy of church music in Sweden.

My scholarly interests are within the field of early modern music history. I have particularly been interested in issues of music practice, cultural transfer, appropriation, adaptation and issues concerning the relationship periphery-center. Methodologically I have been interested in the study of musical manuscripts as artifacts and through these the ability to approach and draw conclusions about how the music was transmitted, acquired, via which networks and social structures, and the shaping of contemporary musical practice. My thesis project during 2008-2013 dealt with the music practice at the Swedish court 1663–90. The thesis, “Gustav Düben at Work: Musical Repertory and Practice of Swedish Court Musicians, 1663-1690” deals with various aspects of the response to cultural transfer, especially various adaptation processes, on basis of the identification and investigation of different repertoires and contemporary practices. A prerequisite for the project has been the extensive and well-preserved Düben Collection, now in Uppsala University Library. To get answers to the many previously unresolved questions surrounding the collection, it has been necessary to approach questions of its original structure and early history. Other previously unsolved and under-researched issues concern its function, character and status. Parts of the results have been implemented in The Düben Collection Database Catalogue, such as attributions of a significant number compositions, previously regarded as anonymous, concordances between manuscripts and prints and a demarcation of the content of the collection towards the library's other musical holdings. One of the significant results has been the establishment of provenance concerning a large collection of French theatrical music, a prerequisite for further research on this material. 2014-16, I worked within a project with the aim to create a reseach database of and digitize this collection.

I presently work within two research projects: "Translatio musicae: French and Italian Music in Northern Europe, c. 1650–1730" (from 2019) and "Music at Court and University During Sweden’s Age of Liberty (1718-1772)"(from 2020), both together with Lars Berglund and both funded by the Swedish Foundation for Humanities and Social Sciences. I also participate in the project "Kyrkomusik i Sverige från medeltid till nutid" (A history of church music in Sweden).