The three-year Bachelor’s degree programme in Organ Playing and Sacred Music assumes that the applicant has studied previously, usually at a conservatory or music college. Private study is not excluded. A student who demonstrates a high degree of talent, reliability as a player, musical imagination and the ability to sonically represent (register) the works performed is admitted to this programme.
In the specialisation Sacred Music, the entrance examination includes three disciplines: organ performance, organ improvisation and conducting. Applicants also take a test to demonstrate their knowledge and insight into the cultural field. The study of the Bachelor’s programme Organ Performance and Sacred Music builds on the skills acquired in previous years, develops the student’s ability to study musical repertoire independently and in all contexts, and leads the student to a broader knowledge of the historical and contemporary context.
Course of the admission procedure
- Playing the organ
- the composition of J. S. Bach, with the exception of the so-called 8 small preludes and fugues
- trio piece by J. S. Bach (fast)
- J. S. Bach’s chorale with coloured c. f.
- composition from the Romantic period
- Improvisation
- practical combining of major and minor fifths including their reversals (strict and free combining) in the keys of C, G, D, A, F, B, E flat major; a, e, h, f sharp, d, g , c minor
- short cadence using off-tone dominants in any given key
- eight-bar period with a leading and trailing in any given key
- accompaniment to the melody of the song
- free improvisation on the given theme
- practical design of the numbered bass
- Conducting
- mastery of basic conducting techniques in the range of:
- basic stance, basic hand posture – use of the baton
- two basic conducting movements – preparation and entrance
- the different types of bars and their timing scheme (two- to twelve-beat)
- basic dynamics (crescendo and decrescendo)
- onboarding
- closing gestures – crowns (fermata)
- tempo performance of compositions – basic agogics
- Practical conducting at the piano:
- B. Smetana: Three Women’s Choirs
- B. Smetana.
- mastery of basic conducting techniques in the range of:
- Organ playing, improvisation and conducting each make up 30% of the total score.
The entrance examination includes a general knowledge test, which makes up 10% of the total score.