The son left his mother, and went sorrowing into the pine forest, where he cut down a tree, and made a fiddle2 on which he played; and his mother, hearing the sound, came running by and took the curse from off his head.
This story must surely have been written of a gypsy boy, for of none other could it have been equally appropriate; and if to the gypsy woman is given a certain power over the minds of her fellow-creatures, the male Tzigane—at least in Hungary—is not without his sceptre, and this sceptre is the bow with which he plies3 his fiddle.
Hungarian music and the Tzigane player are indispensable conditions of each other’s existence. Hungarian music can only be rightly interpreted by the Tzigane musician, who for his part can play none other so well as the Hungarian music, into whose execution he throws all his heart and his soul, all his latent passion and unconscious poetry—the melancholy4 and dissatisfied yearnings of an outcast, the deep despondency of an exile who has never known a home, and the wild freedom of a savage6 who never owned a master.
Did the Tziganes bring their music ready-made into Hungary, or did they find it there and merely adopt it? is a question which has occasioned much learned controversy8. Liszt inclines to the former opinion, which would mean that no Hungarian music existed previous to the Tziganes’ arrival in the country in the fifteenth century. That this music is essentially9 of an Asiatic character is, however, no positive proof in favor of this theory, for are not the Hungarians themselves an out-wandered Asiatic race? and what more natural than the supposition that one Asiatic race should be the best interpreter of the music of a kindred people? More likely, however, this music is an unconscious joint10 production of the two, the Tzigane being the artist who has sounded the depths of the Hungarian nature and given expression to it.
I remember once asking a distinguished11 Polish lady—Princess C——, herself a notable musician and pupil of the great Chopin—whether she ever played Hungarian music. “No,” she answered, “I cannot play it; there is something in that music which I have not got—something wanting in me.”
What was here wanting I came to understand later, when I became familiar with Hungarian music as rendered by the Tzigane players. It was the training of several generations of gypsy life which was here wanting—a training which alone teaches the secret of deciphering those wild strains which seem borrowed from the voice of the tempest, or stolen from whispering reeds. In order to have played Hungarian music aright she would have required to have slept on mountain-tops during a score of years, to have been bathed over and{267} over again in falling dews, to have shared the food of eagles and squirrels, and have been on equally intimate terms with stags and snakes—conditions which, unfortunately, lie quite out of the reach of delicate Polish ladies!
Music was the only art within the Tzigane’s reach, for despite his vividness of imagination and the continual state of inspiration in which he may be said to live, he could never have been a poet, painter, or sculptor12 to any eminent13 degree, because of the fitfulness of his nature, and of his incapacity to clothe his inspirations in a precise image, or reduce them to a given form. Every man has the impulse to manifest his feelings in some way or other, and music was the only way open to the Tzigane, as being the one solitary14 art which, à la rigueur, can dispense15 with a scientific training and be taught by instinct alone.
Devoid16 of printed notes the Tzigane is not forced to divide his attention between a sheet of paper and his instrument, and there is consequently nothing to detract from the utter abandonment with which he absorbs himself in his playing. He seems to be sunk in an inner world of his own; the instrument sobs17 and moans in his hands, and is pressed tight against his heart as though it had grown and taken root there. This is the true moment of inspiration, to which he rarely gives way, and then only in the privacy of an intimate circle, never before a numerous and unsympathetic audience. Himself spellbound by the power of the tones he evokes18, his head gradually sinking lower and lower over the instrument, the body bent19 forward in an attitude of rapt attention, and his ear seeming to hearken to far-off ghostly strains audible to himself alone, the untaught Tzigane achieves a perfection of expression unattainable by mere7 professional training.
This power of identification with his music is the real secret of the Tzigane’s influence over his audience. Inspired and carried away by his own strains, he must perforce carry his hearers with him as well; and the Hungarian listener throws himself heart and soul into this species of musical intoxication20, which to him is the greatest delight on earth. There is a proverb which says, “The Hungarian only requires a gypsy fiddler and a glass of water in order to make him quite drunk;” and indeed intoxication is the only word fittingly to describe the state of exaltation into which I have seen a Hungarian audience thrown by a gypsy band.
Sometimes, under the combined influence of music and wine, the{268} Tziganes become like creatures possessed21; the wild cries and stamps of an equally excited audience only stimulate22 them to greater exertions23. The whole atmosphere seems tossed by billows of passionate24 harmony; we seem to catch sight of the electric sparks of inspiration flying through the air. It is then that the Tzigane player gives forth25 everything that is secretly lurking26 within him—fierce anger, childish wailings, presumptuous28 exaltation, brooding melancholy, and passionate despair; and at such moments, as a Hungarian writer has said, one could readily believe in his power of drawing down the angels from heaven into hell!
Listen how another Hungarian has here described the effect of their music:
“How it rushes through the veins29 like electric fire! How it penetrates30 straight to the soul! In soft, plaintive31 minor32 tones the adagio33 opens with a slow, rhythmical34 movement: it is a sighing and longing35 of unsatisfied aspirations36; a craving37 for undiscovered happiness; the lover’s yearning5 for the object of his affection; the expression of mourning for lost joys, for happy days gone forever: then abruptly38 changing to a major key the tones get faster and more agitated39; and from the whirlpool of harmony the melody gradually detaches itself, alternately drowned in the foam40 of over-breaking waves, to reappear floating on the surface with undulating motion—collecting as it were fresh power for a renewed burst of fury. But quickly as the storm came it is gone again, and the music relapses into the melancholy yearnings of heretofore.”
These two extremes of fiercest passion and plaintive wailing27 characterize the nature of the Hungarian, of whom it is said that, “weeping, the Hungarian makes merry.”
Under the influence of Tzigane music a Hungarian is capable of flinging about his money with the most reckless extravagance—fifty, a hundred, a thousand florins and more being often given for the performance of a single melody. Sometimes a gentleman will stick a large bank-note behind his ear, while the Tzigane proceeds to play his favorite tune41, drawing nearer and nearer till he is almost touching42; pouring the melody straight into the upturned ear of the enraptured43 auditor44; dropping out the notes as though the music were some exquisitely45 flavored liquid flattering the palate of this superrefined gourmet46, who, with half-closed eyes expressive47 of perfect beatitude, entirely48 abandons himself to the delirious49 ecstasy50.
Not only do the people at rustic51 gatherings52 dance to the strains of these brown bohemians, but in no real Hungarian ball-room would other music be tolerated, and the Austrian military bands, so much prized elsewhere, are here at a discount and little appreciated.
GYPSY MUSICIANS.
Of course the gypsy bands in large towns are not composed of the ragged53, unkempt individuals who haunt the village pothouses or the lonely csardas[65] on the puszta. Their constant intercourse54 with higher circles has given them a certain degree of polish, and they mostly appear in Hungarian costume; but intrinsically they are ever the same as their more vagabond brethren, and their eye never loses the semi-savage glitter reminding one of a half-tamed animal.
The calling of musician has often become hereditary55 in certain families, who thus feel themselves to be interwoven with the fates of the nobility for whom they play; and vice56 versa, for the youth of both sexes in Hungary the recollection of every pleasure they have enjoyed, the dawn of first love, and every alternation of hope, triumph, jealousy57, or despair, is inextricably interwoven with the image of the Tzigane player. As Mr. Patterson says, “The Tzigane is a sort of retainer of the Magyar, who cannot well live without him—the insolent58 good-nature of the one just fitting in with the simple-hearted servility of the other; hence the Tzigane is most commonly found in those parts of the country where Hungarians and Roumanians are in the majority. He does not find the neighborhood of the hard-working, money-loving Suabians profitable to him.” Those who are successful musicians gain a sort of abnormal social status far above their fellows. The proverb, “No entertainment without the gypsies,” is acted upon by peasant and prince alike. Those nobles who have squandered59 their fortunes would, if they took the trouble to analyze60 the causes of their ruin, find the Tzigane player to form one of the heaviest items. As to the peasant there is a popular rhyme which says that if the Tzigane plays badly he gets his head broken with his own fiddle; but should he succeed in touching the feelings of the excitable peasant, the latter will give him the shirt off his own back.
English people are apt to misunderstand the position of these Tzigane musicians, which is in every way a peculiar61 one—the intimacy62 with the upper classes thus brought about by their calling implying, however, no sort of equality. The Tzigane remains63 the gypsy fiddler, while the Magyar never forgets that he is a nobleman; and the barrier between the two classes is as absolute as that between Jew and gentleman in Poland. Although it is no uncommon64 sight in the streets of any Hungarian town, towards the small hours of the morning, to see distinguished members of the jeunesse dorée (their spirits, no doubt, slightly raised by wine) going home affectionately linked arm-in arm with these brown fiddlers, yet no Hungarian could fall into the amusing mistake of an English nobleman, who, making a point of lionizing all celebrities65 within reach, invited to dinner the first violin of a gypsy band starring in London some years ago. The flattering invitation occasioned the most intense surprise to the distinguished artist himself, who, though well used to many forms of enthusiasm called forth by his genius, was certainly not accustomed to be seriously{271} taken in the sense of a civilized66 human being. It is said, however, that the gypsy’s quickness of perception, doing duty for education on this occasion, enabled him to pass through the formidable ordeal67 of a London dinner-party without further breaches68 of our rigid69 etiquette70 than are quite permissible71 on the part of a barbarous grandee72.
It is said that the Tziganes often perform the office of postillon d’amour in taking letters backward and forward between young people who have no other means of communication, their peculiar code of honor forbidding them to take any pecuniary73 remuneration in return. Thus many of them are able to show dainty pieces of handiwork and presents of valuable jewelled studs or amber74 mouth-pieces, received from their high-born patrons in token of gratitude75 for delicate services rendered.
The words “Tzigane” and “musician” have become almost synonymous in Hungary, and to say “I shall call in the Tziganes” is equivalent to saying “I shall send for the musicians.”
When the dancers are limp and indolent the Tzigane musician loses interest as well, and plays carelessly and without spirit; but when he sees dancing con1 amore, and more especially if his playing be praised, then he knows neither hunger nor fatigue76. He executes every sort of dance music with spirit, and his power of identifying himself with the dancers renders the gypsy’s playing far superior to that of other professional musicians; but his real triumph is the csardas.
The band-master is fond of secretly selecting a couple from among the dancers, and at these directing his music—aiming it at them, if one may thus express it—following their every movement, and identifying himself with their every gesture. To watch a pair of lovers dancing is the gypsy player’s greatest delight, and for them he exerts himself to the utmost, throwing his whole soul into the music, breathing the softest sighs and the most passionate rhapsodies of which his instrument is capable.
The Tzigane band-master—or, rather, the first violin, for the gypsies require no one to beat time for them—when playing in the ball-room, is wont77 to change the melody as fancy prompts, merely giving warning to his colleagues by two sharp raps of the bow that a change is impending78. The other musicians do not know beforehand what tune is coming, but a note or two suffices to put them on the scent79, and they fall in so smoothly80 that the transition is scarcely detected.
Almost every one of the dancers has his or her favorite air—their nota, as it is here called—and it is meant as a delicate attention when the Tzigane band-master, smiling or winking81 at a passing dancer, strikes into his air of predilection82. The gypsy’s memory in thus retaining (and never confounding) the favorite airs of each separate person in a large society is marvellous; and not only this, but he will likewise remember to a nicety which air was your favorite one three or four years ago, and all the attendant circumstances to which the former melody played accompaniment.
Thus, whirling past in the mazes83 of your favorite valse, with the girl you adore on your arm, you may catch the dark eye of the Tzigane player fixed84 expressively85 upon you, and in the next moment the music has changed; it is a long-forgotten melody they are playing now—a melody once familiar to your ears at a by-gone time, when you had other thoughts, other hopes, another partner on your arm; when wood-violet, not patchouly, was perchance the scent you loved best, and fair ringlets had more charm than raven86 tresses.
For a moment the present scene has faded from your eyes, and in its place you see a vanished face and hear a voice grown strange to your ears. That valse, once to you the most entrancing music on earth, now sounds like the gibings of some tormenting87 spirit, and you breathe an involuntary sigh for a time that is no more!
Thus the Tzigane player, unlike the hired musicians in other countries, has an intimate and artistic88 connection with his dancers. In England or Germany the musician is simply the machine which plays, no more to be regarded than a barrel-organ or a musical-box; in Hungary alone he is something more, his power of directing being here not limited to the feet, but may almost be said to extend to the fancies and feelings of his audience—feelings which it is his delight to share and sway, with actual power to stimulate love or jealousy, and reawaken grief and remorse89, at the touch of his magic wand.
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1
con
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| n.反对的观点，反对者，反对票，肺病；vt.精读，学习，默记；adv.反对地，从反面；adj.欺诈的 | |
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fiddle
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| n.小提琴；vi.拉提琴；不停拨弄，乱动 | |
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plies
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| v.使用（工具）( ply的第三人称单数 )；经常供应（食物、饮料）；固定往来；经营生意 | |
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melancholy
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| n.忧郁，愁思；adj.令人感伤（沮丧）的，忧郁的 | |
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yearning
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| a.渴望的；向往的；怀念的 | |
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savage
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| adj.野蛮的；凶恶的，残暴的；n.未开化的人 | |
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7
mere
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| adj.纯粹的；仅仅，只不过 | |
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8
controversy
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| n.争论，辩论，争吵 | |
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9
essentially
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| adv.本质上，实质上，基本上 | |
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10
joint
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| adj.联合的，共同的；n.关节，接合处；v.连接，贴合 | |
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11
distinguished
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| adj.卓越的，杰出的，著名的 | |
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sculptor
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| n.雕刻家，雕刻家 | |
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eminent
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| adj.显赫的，杰出的，有名的，优良的 | |
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solitary
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| adj.孤独的，独立的，荒凉的；n.隐士 | |
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15
dispense
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| vt.分配，分发；配(药)，发(药)；实施 | |
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devoid
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| adj.全无的，缺乏的 | |
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17
sobs
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| 啜泣（声），呜咽（声）( sob的名词复数 ) | |
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18
evokes
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| 产生，引起，唤起( evoke的第三人称单数 ) | |
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bent
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| n.爱好，癖好；adj.弯的；决心的，一心的 | |
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intoxication
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| n.wild excitement;drunkenness；poisoning | |
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21
possessed
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| adj.疯狂的；拥有的，占有的 | |
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stimulate
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| vt.刺激，使兴奋；激励，使…振奋 | |
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23
exertions
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| n.努力( exertion的名词复数 )；费力；（能力、权力等的）运用；行使 | |
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24
passionate
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| adj.热情的，热烈的，激昂的，易动情的，易怒的，性情暴躁的 | |
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forth
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| adv.向前；向外，往外 | |
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lurking
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| 潜在 | |
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wailing
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| v.哭叫，哀号( wail的现在分词 )；沱 | |
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presumptuous
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| adj.胆大妄为的，放肆的，冒昧的，冒失的 | |
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veins
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| n.纹理；矿脉( vein的名词复数 )；静脉；叶脉；纹理 | |
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penetrates
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| v.穿过( penetrate的第三人称单数 )；刺入；了解；渗透 | |
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plaintive
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| adj.可怜的，伤心的 | |
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minor
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| adj.较小(少)的，较次要的；n.辅修学科；vi.辅修 | |
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adagio
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| adj.缓慢的；n.柔板；慢板；adv.缓慢地 | |
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rhythmical
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| adj.有节奏的，有韵律的 | |
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longing
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| n.（for）渴望 | |
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aspirations
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| 强烈的愿望( aspiration的名词复数 )； 志向； 发送气音； 发 h 音 | |
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craving
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| n.渴望,热望 | |
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abruptly
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| adv.突然地，出其不意地 | |
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agitated
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| adj.被鼓动的，不安的 | |
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foam
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| v./n.泡沫，起泡沫 | |
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tune
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| n.调子；和谐，协调；v.调音，调节，调整 | |
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42
touching
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| adj.动人的，使人感伤的 | |
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enraptured
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| v.使狂喜( enrapture的过去式和过去分词 ) | |
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auditor
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| n.审计员，旁听着 | |
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45
exquisitely
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| adv.精致地；强烈地；剧烈地；异常地 | |
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46
gourmet
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| n.食物品尝家；adj.出于美食家之手的 | |
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47
expressive
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| adj.表现的，表达…的，富于表情的 | |
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48
entirely
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| ad.全部地，完整地；完全地，彻底地 | |
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49
delirious
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| adj.不省人事的，神智昏迷的 | |
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50
ecstasy
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| n.狂喜，心醉神怡，入迷 | |
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51
rustic
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| adj.乡村的，有乡村特色的；n.乡下人，乡巴佬 | |
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52
gatherings
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| 聚集( gathering的名词复数 )； 收集； 采集； 搜集 | |
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53
ragged
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| adj.衣衫褴褛的，粗糙的，刺耳的 | |
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54
intercourse
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| n.性交；交流，交往，交际 | |
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hereditary
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| adj.遗传的，遗传性的，可继承的，世袭的 | |
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56
vice
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| n.坏事；恶习；[pl.]台钳，老虎钳；adj.副的 | |
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57
jealousy
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| n.妒忌，嫉妒，猜忌 | |
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insolent
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| adj.傲慢的，无理的 | |
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59
squandered
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| v.（指钱，财产等）浪费，乱花( squander的过去式和过去分词 ) | |
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60
analyze
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| vt.分析，解析 (=analyse) | |
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peculiar
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| adj.古怪的，异常的；特殊的，特有的 | |
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intimacy
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| n.熟悉，亲密，密切关系，亲昵的言行 | |
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remains
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| n.剩余物，残留物；遗体，遗迹 | |
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uncommon
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| adj.罕见的，非凡的，不平常的 | |
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celebrities
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| n.（尤指娱乐界的）名人( celebrity的名词复数 )；名流；名声；名誉 | |
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civilized
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| a.有教养的，文雅的 | |
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ordeal
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| n.苦难经历，（尤指对品格、耐力的）严峻考验 | |
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breaches
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| 破坏( breach的名词复数 )； 破裂； 缺口； 违背 | |
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69
rigid
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| adj.严格的，死板的；刚硬的，僵硬的 | |
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etiquette
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| n.礼仪，礼节；规矩 | |
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permissible
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| adj.可允许的，许可的 | |
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grandee
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| n.贵族；大公 | |
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73
pecuniary
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| adj.金钱的；金钱上的 | |
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amber
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| n.琥珀；琥珀色；adj.琥珀制的 | |
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75
gratitude
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| adj.感激，感谢 | |
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76
fatigue
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| n.疲劳，劳累 | |
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77
wont
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| adj.习惯于；v.习惯；n.习惯 | |
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78
impending
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| a.imminent, about to come or happen | |
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79
scent
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| n.气味，香味，香水，线索，嗅觉；v.嗅，发觉 | |
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80
smoothly
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| adv.平滑地，顺利地，流利地，流畅地 | |
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81
winking
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| n.瞬眼，目语v.使眼色( wink的现在分词 )；递眼色（表示友好或高兴等）；（指光）闪烁；闪亮 | |
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82
predilection
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| n.偏好 | |
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83
mazes
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| 迷宫( maze的名词复数 )； 纷繁复杂的规则； 复杂难懂的细节； 迷宫图 | |
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84
fixed
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| adj.固定的，不变的，准备好的；(计算机)固定的 | |
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85
expressively
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| ad.表示(某事物)地；表达地 | |
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86
raven
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| n.渡鸟，乌鸦；adj.乌亮的 | |
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87
tormenting
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| 使痛苦的，使苦恼的 | |
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88
artistic
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| adj.艺术(家)的，美术(家)的；善于艺术创作的 | |
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89
remorse
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| n.痛恨，悔恨，自责 | |
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