In July 2025, the 22nd annual international colloquy From Folklore to World Music took place in Náměšt nad Oslavou, Czech Republic, within the Folk Holidays festival programme. This meeting between the academic and music writers’ communities, including musicians, first took place in 2003. It was intended as a discussion forum for resolving current themes and problems and as a place for sharing the results of people’s work. That first colloquy was rather terminological; the others since then have been rather thematic, allowing those taking part to consider music in all its diverse connections.
The theme of this year’s colloquy, “Purists and Innovators”, may at first glance give the impression of a search for opposites. In a similar vein, the Czech Dictionary of Foreign Words defines ‘purism’ as “an attempt at stylistic purity or cleansing of national languages from foreign influences” and ‘innovation’ as “renewing, improving, or introducing something new”. The creative efforts of purists or innovators however do not always represent opposite extremes – because both paths, despite their different starting points, go side-by-side, and those who follow them need each other. When Karel Čapek reflected on the Czech language in this dichotomy, he wrote, “The conflict between the purists and the rest of us is unnecessary: for purists, the school is important; for us, it’s more about speaking, communication, and poetry – and from time to time, just as one sometimes has to go back to their multiplication tables, we go back to the pure grammar of our speech.” (Karel Čapek: O dnešním jazyce. Lidové noviny, 7 February 1932)
The first section of contributions of the two-day colloquy was dedicated primarily to folklore – to individuals, groups, institutions, and projects documenting and presenting primarily European traditional (folk) music. Discussions took place on creating an image of the folk tradition in the context of purism and innovation, on folk theatre, on innovations to simplify the use of folk music instruments, on the approaches of Slovak children’s folk ensembles and Moravian cimbalom musicians to tradition, and the necessity of combining purism with innovations in reconstructing traditional music for which we have only a limited number of sources. For example, the role of two Estonian theatre groups in raising the awareness of Estonian cultural heritage in that country was mentioned in this context.
The second part of the colloquium programme dealt with misconceptions on the part of music writers and historians, showing that ‘pure’ icons of traditional American blues or blues music, such as Howlin’ Wolf and Jimmie Rodgers, were actually innovators – and raising also the question as to how ‘pure’ was ever traditional Irish folk music. Using examples of contemporary Polish and African musicians, there was a discussion about how today’s (not only folk) musicians cope with the heavy burden of tradition and how they adapt it. And also about how difficult it can be for European musicians and audiences to penetrate the completely different context of African talking drums. And in the wake of the 2025 Czech release of the film A Complete Unknown, based on Elijah Wald’s book on the 1965 Newport Folk Festival, Dylan Goes Electric! Newport, Seeger, Dylan, and the Night that Split the Sixties (2015), the folk festival which became a rock festival made ample food for thought for the colloquy participants, even becoming the theme of the festival’s daily bulletin. However, as the contributions to this volume point out, scandals, divisions, and discussions have reguraly accompanied the development of (not only traditional) music, and disputes between purists and innovators are its driving voice. A neverending story.
The contributions which took place at the colloquium – most of which are contained in this collection – are proof that traditional and innovative approaches in music are not polar opposites, but are rather mutually complementary directions or methods in one’s way of thinking. A philosophical dimension on this non-dichotomous duo was presented at the colloquium by the Norwegian music writer Sigbjørn Nedland, a long-time advocate of cross-cultural musical dialogue. His essay symbolically closes the volume.

^{(from the introduction)}

From Folklore to World Music: PURISTS AND INNOVATORS

• OBSAH - Contents (PDF)
• Úvodem (PDF)
• Introduction (PDF)
• Martina Pavlicová – Lucie Uhlíková | Puristé, inovátoři a vytváření obrazu folklorní tradice: Folklor jako dobová kulturní  reprezentace (PDF)
• Martina Pavlicová – Lucie Uhlíková | Purists, Innovators, and the Shaping of the Image of Folklore Tradition: Folklore as a Cultural Representation of Its Time (PDF)
• Jiří Čevela | Herní příležitost jako dramaturg – úvahy nad repertoárem cimbálových muzik na Slovácku (PDF)
• Juraj Hamar | Puristi, novátori a tí druhí na príklade scénickej tvorby pre detské folklórne súbory na Slovensku (PDF)
• Bernard Garaj | Výroba ľudových hudobných nástrojov na Slovensku v priesečníku purizmu a novátorstva (PDF)
• Bernard Garaj | The Making of Folk Musical Instruments in Slovakia at the Intersection of Purism and Innovation (PDF)
• Marian Friedl | Inovátor pod rouškou puristy – o projektu Kuhländische Lieder (PDF)
• Marta Ulrychová | Hořické pašijové hry v rukou inovátorů (PDF)
• Iivi Zájedová | Vanemuine a Estonia: historické peripetie dvou předních estonských divadel (PDF)
• Radvan Markus | Marsyas, Apollón a nejstarší dějiny irské hudby (PDF)
• Antonín Procházka | Bubny, které mluví (PDF)
• Milan Tesař | Současné tendence v polské world music: mezi tradicí a experimentem (PDF)
• Brad Vice | Howlin’ Wolf Inside/Outside the Delta: Blues Purity and Innovation (PDF)
• David Livingstone | The ‘Father’ of Country Music: Jimmie Rodgers as Innovator (PDF)
• Petr Dorůžka | Od mahlerovské citace o plameni a popelu k dylanovskému skandálu s elektrickými kytarami (PDF)
• Sigbjørn Nedland | Innovation from Tradition (PDF)
• Medailony autorů (PDF)
• Notes of Contributors (PDF)

• Complete book (PDF)