Music Publishing and Trade

In the nineteenth century, the development of printing technology made printing musical scores faster and more affordable, and songbooks also began to be pub-lished as sheet music editions. At the same time, better means of transport made it easier to import instruments and notebooks. These changes enabled the establish-ment of the first music stores in Finland.

In the first half of the nineteenth century, books and also songs were ordered from Central Europe and Sweden to Finnish bookstores. Most of the nineteenth-century sheet music was for the piano; the popularity of various clavier instruments pro-moted the publishing and sale of sheet music and vice versa. Ludvig Beuermann (1815–1868) from Germany is considered to be Finland’s first music retailer and

122 ‘[…] skilja sig från de kyrkliga koralernas ädla och upphöjda stil, genom sina från den profana musiken lånade lekande och ofta t.o.m. lättfärdiga melodier.’

music publisher. He founded a sheet music store in Helsinki in 1849. The three bookstores of the town, Frenckell, Wasenius and Öhman, also sold sheet music but the supply was sporadic and the collections limited. Beuermann obtained a large part of his notes from Saint Petersburg (Kurkela 2009, 25, 29, 33).

An association for public education, Kansanvalistusseura, was founded in 1874. It soon developed into a major publisher of Finnish-language literature. In the early 1880s, it began to publish choral and brass band repertoire, especially for the song and play festivals (Kurkela 2009, 69–70). In the second half of the century, the publication of songbooks became more common, which reflected the change in music culture from the entertainment of the middle and upper classes to the activities of the wider strata (ibid., 74-75). However, music publishing was still dispersed and sporadic in the 1880s and 1890s. In Finland, there was not a single agent specialising in music publishing, but sheet music and notebooks were a side business for book publish-ers. Sales of foreign sheet music increased even further. Music store customers still came mainly from the upper strata, either Swedish-speaking or bilingual; almost all sheet music was titled both in Finnish and Swedish, and often the lyrics of the songs were also in both languages (ibid., 91–95).

From the late seventeenth century to the early nineteenth century, most new hymns and spiritual songs were published as broadsides. In the second half of the nine-teenth century, the publishing of hymns and spiritual songs was lively. Publications included mainly only lyrics; sometimes there were sifferskrift numerical notes. Pub-lishers also published separate songbooks, especially if they related to a published text edition (Kurkela 2009, 78).

All of the Finnish spiritual movements also used collections of spiritual songs. Sionin Wirret (‘The Hymns of Zion’), translated into Finnish in 1790, was in use in all of the moments, but its 1893 revised edition was meant only for the Awakened. The Prayer Movement stuck to the old Hymnal and songbooks, and therefore, they also continued using Halullisten Sieluin Hengellisiä Lauluja (‘The Spiritual Songs for Devout Souls’) from 1790 and the old version of Sionin Wirret. The Evangelical Movement published its Siionin Kannel (‘The Zion Kantele’) in 1874–1881 in booklet form.

Spiritual movements brought new repertoire, outside of official hymnals. For ex-ample, in the 1840s, the Evangelical Movement started to publish spiritual songs in its devotional books and periodicals as well as sheet music and song booklets.

According to Seppo Suokunnas (1982, 221), from 1845 to 1892, as many as 980 song texts were published, although some of them were duplicates. Based on these, the first edition of Siionin Kannel, published as five different booklets by J.A.G. Hy-mander, included 170 songs. In the 1892 edition, there were 132 additional songs, which brings the total number after some omissions to 277 songs. The musical edition, arranged and published by Ilmari Krohn, included 193 melodies. Many of the melodies in this collection were of German, Swedish or Anglo-Saxon origin, some taken directly from foreign editions, whereas others were taken from various Finnish collections (ibid., 222–224).

From the very beginning, publishing books and booklets belonged to the activities of the Finnish Evangelical Lutheran Mission. The first Swedish publication was edited by Adolf Moberg (1813–1895) in 1862 and the Finnish one in 1864. Both the Awakened and the Prayer Movement shunned the new 1886 Hymnal and continued using the 1701 version. Since Siionin Kannel and Sionin Wirret were collections of a single movement, there was a need for a collection not tied to any particular move-ment, including both hymns and spiritual songs. As a result, the Finnish Evangelical Lutheran Mission edited a Finnish collection Hengellisiä lauluja ja virsiä (‘Spiritual Songs and Hymns’) and its Swedish counterpoint Andliga sånger och psalmer, both of which were published in 1900 (Vaalas 1973, 22, 26–29).

The Lutheran Evangelical Association in Finland and the Finnish Evangelical Lu-theran Mission became the most important publishers of collections of spiritual songs, but there were many others as well. Many bigger publishing companies, such as Weilin & Göös and Werner Söderström (WSOY), included spiritual songs in their publication policy (Kurkela 2009, 81–82). The most important collections of spiri-tual songs published in the latter part of the century are listed in Table 8.

Both the change in religious music and improving congregational singing led, by the 1890s, to a considerable number of songbooks containing hymns and spiritual songs, including either piano accompaniment or only melodies, often with sifferskrift numerical notation. According to Vesa Kurkela (2009, 81) between 1840 and 1890

more than fifty hymn collections with musical scores were published in Finland. The number of collections of spiritual songs was even bigger, almost a hundred editions were printed, albeit most of which were author’s editions. One reason for such a large number of printed collections of liturgical melodies was that there were so many publishers interested in them and music stores that sold them.

Table 8. The most important collections of spiritual songs published in Finland 1850–1900.

year title editor publisher

1850 Andeliga sånger J. C. Frenckell

& Son

1866 Andaktssånger till kristlig väckelse och uppbyggelse Adolf Moberg FELM 1869 Matka-lauluja tiellä taivaalliseen Siioniin Bernhard Kristfrid

Sarlin FELM

1876–1884 Lauluja Karitsan kiitokseksi 1–8 Ira D. Sankey;

Olli Vuorinen (transl.) Weilin & Göös

1886 Harpunsäveliä Hjalmar Braxén Olán

1887 Barnens Sångbok SLEY

1888 Harpotoner Hjalmar Braxén

-1889 Lähetys-virsiä, uusi kokoelma Olli Vuorinen FELM

1890 Sotalauluja Salvation Army

1891 Krigssånger Salvation Army

1894 Rauhansäveliä Gustaf Alfred Hidén;

Juho Laine (transl.)

Rauhan sanoma

1894 Sionin Wirret Wilhelm Malmberg Herättäjä

1895 Lunastettuin lauluja matkalla Sioniin Pietari Kurvinen Pietari Kurvinen

1896 Pyhäkoulun laulukirja Axel Keihänen WSOY

1900 Andliga sånger och psalmer Herman Råbergh FELM

1900–1905 Hengellisä lauluja ja virsiä FELM

The increase in music publishing and trade enabled the standardisation of congre-gational singing but also made it more confusing. Through more affordable sheet music publishing and a good network of book and music stores, both chorale books and collections of liturgical melodies could be effectively distributed to churchwar-dens and the ordinary people. On the other hand, the same ease also led to a huge number of different collections: spiritual songs, hymnals, collections of liturgical melodies, in one and four parts, with sifferskrift and Western stave notation, et cetera.