In 2015 the Prague-based Ensemble Inégal organized the first Zelenka Festival Prague, an event featuring concerts and a one-day conference devoted to the music of Jan Dismas Zelenka (1679–1745) and his world. The year 2018 marked the fourth instalment of this multi-city festival: in addition to concerts and the conference in Prague, attendees were also treated to a performance of two Zelenka works, the Missa Sancti Spiritus (zwv4) and Litaniae Lauretanae ‘Consolatrix afflictorum’ (zwv151), in Dresden, the city Zelenka called home from 1710 until his death in 1745. The first of these two works deserves special mention: the performance in Prague represented the Czech premiere of the mass as the result of a new critical edition by Andrew Frampton (‘Jan Dismas Zelenka's Missa Sancti Spiritus, ZWV 4: A Critical Edition and Study of the Manuscript Sources’ (MMus thesis, University of Melbourne, 2015)). Interpreted by Ensemble Inégal and the Dresdner Kammerchor under the direction of Adam Viktora, this performance was given first in Prague and then repeated in Dresden. Two additional concerts, performed respectively by Musica Florea and Musica Aeterna, highlighted Zelenka's orchestral compositions as well as offering a selection of Italian works from his fascinating collection of secular vocal music. The latter was introduced by Jóhannes Ágústsson (independent scholar, Reykjavík), who also wrote the accompanying programme notes, and featured sopranos Gabriela Eibenová and Lenka Cafourková. Alongside the conference, these excellent performances helped to situate Zelenka's own music within the composer's wider world and were a welcome aspect of the festival.

The 2018 conference consisted of seven papers and a celebration of the work of Janice B. Stockigt (University of Melbourne), who also chaired the conference, on the occasion of the publication of her book Jan Dismas Zelenka (1679–1745): A Bohemian Musician at the Court of Dresden (Oxford: Oxford University Press, 2000) in the Czech language (trans. Vlasta Hesounová, Prague: Nakladatelsví Vyšehrad, 2018). Bringing together leading Zelenka scholars with differing approaches and perspectives, the conference was filled with lively debate; its atmosphere was that of a convivial gathering of specialists connected by a strong desire to forge new paths in Zelenka research while continuing to raise the reputation and public awareness of the composer. The mutual respect between all speakers and their enthusiasm for their subject were clear throughout the day.

The seven conference papers were presented in four short sessions, beginning with a detailed and carefully researched investigation from Lukáš Vokřínek (Univerzita Karlova) into godparenthood in the family of the schoolmaster, organist and father of Zelenka, Jiřík Zelenka Bavorovský. Vokřínek explained the significance of godparenthood in early modern Bohemian rural areas for a family's social status and presented a wealth of data showing the number of children for whom Zelenka Bavorovský and his wife, Marie (Magdalena) Zelenková, served as godparents. This intriguing paper provided an excellent backdrop to the conference by capturing the social network in which Zelenka's parents moved and situating Zelenka himself within this local milieu.

Two papers considered the place of Zelenka's music in a number of libraries and collections. The first of these was from Václav Kapsa (Institute of Ethnology, Akademie věd České republiky). Kapsa explored the evidence concerning performances of Zelenka's music – listed in the inventory of the Knights of the Cross with the Red Star – in Prague in the 1730s and 1740s, using the well-known yet unpublished transcription of the inventory by Jiří Fukač. Kapsa demonstrated that although Zelenka's works were heard in Prague at this time, those in the inventory were pieces from 1724 or before. Considering connections between the Catholic courts of Prague and Dresden at this time, Kapsa noted that the number of pieces by Zelenka in the inventory is strikingly low. Such fascinating data not only raised questions about the Prague reception of Zelenka's music during 1720s and 30s, but also drew a vivid picture of musical life in Prague before the mid-eighteenth century.

Kapsa's paper was followed by one from Maria Sawinkova (Gnessin Russian Academy of Music). We were privileged to hear from her about three manuscript sources from Zelenka's collection of musical scores currently held in the Dresden collection of the Russian State Library, Moscow. These manuscripts comprise sets of parts to accompany scores: a Credo setting by Giuseppe Aldrovandini (D-Dl, Mus. 2204-D-2), a motet entitled O quam suavis by Attilio Ariosti (D-Dl, Mus. 2156-E-1) and the Miserere by Gregorio Allegri (D-Dl, Mus. 2-E-12). These parts represent only a fraction of the sources from Dresden now in the Russian State Library that testify to the history of displaced cultural property – here, German objects transferred to the Soviet Union after the repatriation agreement of 1945. Sawinkova provided a considered and sensitive analysis of this history while drawing attention to annotations in the aforementioned manuscripts from Zelenka's copyists and partly in his own hand. Her analysis of the parts to accompany the Dresden score of the Allegri Miserere was particularly interesting, raising several important questions regarding the identification of the source's scribes, as well as the location of missing parts prepared in Dresden that once accompanied Palestrina's Miserere setting, a score copy still held there (D-Dl, Mus. 2-E-12).

Additionally, Sawinkova highlighted a number of other significant items of music in the Dresden collection held in the Russian State Library. Particularly noteworthy are over thirty works by Princess Amalie of Saxony (1794–1870); manuscripts of three operas by Karl Gottlieb Reissiger (1798–1859); works by Giovanni Alberto Ristori (1692–1753), Johann Adolf Hasse (1699–1783), and Johann Michael Breunich (1699–1755); and collections of Italian arias and scores from the collection of Maria Antonia Walpurgis (1724–1780), all with stamps of the Royal Collection of Dresden. It is important to note that work at the Russian State Library to catalogue the first selection from the Dresden collection is ongoing. On 18 November 2018 Barbara Wiermann of the Sächsisches Landesbibliothek – Staats- und Universitätsbibliothek (SLUB) Dresden reported that Achim Bonte (General Director, SLUB) and Vadim V. Duda (General Director, Russian State Library) had signed an agreement making possible the digitization and digital release of 250 manuscripts from the Dresden collection of the Russian State Library. These are exciting developments, and we will hopefully soon see more work from Sawinkova – and other scholars – on this collection.

Following Kapsa and Sawinkova, we heard two stimulating papers from Andrew Frampton (University of Oxford) and Kjartan Óskarsson (Tónlistarskólinn í Reykjavik) which examined instrumentation in and sources for Zelenka's music. Frampton explored the complex performance and transmission history of the composer's Missa Sancti Spiritus, zwv4, evident from the six non-autograph sources for the piece held today in the Staatsbibliothek zu Berlin – Preußischer Kulturbesitz. The individual stories of each of these sources were told eloquently by Frampton, who framed them as witnesses to the history of zwv4 as he traced their transmission northward from Dresden in the eighteenth century. He explained the important readings of each source not found in the autograph score, demonstrating the significance of these for the text of the work's critical edition. The mammoth task of preparing a critical edition of zwv4 was, as noted earlier, undertaken by Frampton for his master's dissertation, and his paper gave clear insights into the challenges he faced and various triumphs that he enjoyed.

Óskarsson's paper was the perfect complement to Frampton's. Where Frampton examined sources for Zelenka's music on a large scale, Óskarsson focused on one instrument – the chalumeau – and its appearances in Immisit Dominus pestilentiam (zwv58). As Óskarsson explained, this piece from 1709 is noteworthy for its early use of the chalumeau in the context of Zelenka's output; while the instrument was used in two works by Zelenka in the 1720s, it was used more frequently and in some of his most important works in the 1730s. Keeping this in mind, Ósakarsson examined the composer's own history with the chalumeau, including when and where he first encountered the instrument, the works in which he used it and how it was treated. This thought-provoking investigation also revealed new information about the Dresden oboe and chalumeau player Johann Wilhelm Hugo and the possible improvements he made to the chalumeau, inviting further research into this instrument and Zelenka's relationship with it.

The final two papers of the day examined myths about Zelenka's life and works. The first of these, from Jiří K. Kroupa (Association for Central European Studies), sought to determine whether Zelenka had a library and, if so, what its origins, contents and fate were. Following Kroupa, we heard from Frederic Kiernan (University of Melbourne), who examined representations of Zelenka in a variety of literary sources, including those in two biographical studies by Friedrich Rochlitz (Für Freunde der Tonkunst (Leipzig: Carl Cnobloch, 1824–1832)) and Moritz Fürstenau (Zur Geschichte der Musik und des Theaters am Hofe zu Dresden, volume 2 (Dresden: Rudolf Kuntze, 1862)), in order to trace the emergence of the long-held assumption that the composer was ‘lonely and isolated’. Kiernan pinpointed the origin of this assumption in Rochlitz and Fürstenau, arguing for the importance of being critical of these texts as they themselves sometimes relied on questionable sources or interpreted reliable sources in questionable ways. Both Kroupa and Kiernan highlighted the need for musicological scholarship constantly to re-examine and re-evaluate existing knowledge, particularly those popular assumptions that have long been unchallenged.

The papers in the 2018 conference presented widely varied yet complementary investigations of Zelenka's life and works. This was highlighted towards the end of the day by Stockigt, who attributed this variety to the wealth of new information on Zelenka that has been uncovered since the publication of her book in 2000. Stockigt also drew our attention to the new internationalism of Zelenka scholarship. Over the past four years these conferences have drawn reports on Zelenka research from Australia, Iceland, Germany, Russia, the Czech Republic, the United Kingdom and the United States. It was a privilege to attend this gathering of scholars from around the world presenting their innovative and exciting work; it is to be hoped that we will see many new developments in Zelenka research at the 2019 Zelenka Festival.