“The gypsy artists in Hungary play by inspiration, with inimitable verve and spirit, without even knowing their notes, and nothing whatever of the rhymes and rules of the masters. Liszt, who has closely studied them, says, The art of music being for them a sublime language, a song, mystic in itself, though dear to the initiated, they use it according to the wants of the moment which they wish to express. They have invented their music for their own use, to sing about themselves to themselves, to express themselves in the most heartfelt and touching monologues.
“Their music is as free as their lives; no intermediate modulation, no chords, no transition, it goes from one key to another. From ethereal heights they precipitate you into the howling depths of hell; from the plaint, barely heard, they pass brusquely to the warrior’s song, which bursts loudly forth, passionate and tender, at once burning and calm. Their melodies plunge you into a melancholy reverie, or carry you away into a stormy whirlwind; they are a faithful expression of the Hungarian character, sometimes quick, brilliant, and lively, sometimes sad and apathetic.
“The gypsies, when they arrived in Hungary, had no music of their own; they appropriated the Magyar music, and made from it an original art which now belongs to them.”
I here break in upon Messieurs Tissot and Liszt to remark that, while it is very probable that the Roms reformed Hungarian music, it is rather boldly assumed that they had no music of their own. It was, among other callings, as dancers and musicians that they left India and entered Europe, and among them were doubtless many descendants of the ten thousand Indo-Persian Luris or Nuris. But to resume quotation:—
“They made from it an art full of life, passion, laughter, and tears. The instrument which the gypsies prefer is the violin, which they call bas’ alja, ‘the king of instruments.’ They also play the viola, the cymbal, and the clarionet.
“There was a pause. The gypsies, who had perceived at a table a comfortable-looking man, evidently wealthy, and on a pleasure excursion in the town, came down from their platform, and ranged themselves round him to give him a serenade all to himself, as is their custom. They call this ‘playing into the ear.’
“They first asked the gentleman his favorite air, and then played it with such spirit and enthusiasm and overflowing richness of variation and ornament, and with so much emotion, that it drew forth the applause of the whole company. After this they executed a czardas, one of the wildest, most feverish, harshest, and, one may say, tormenting, as if to pour intoxication into the soul of their listener. They watched his countenance to note the impression produced by the passionate rhythm of their instruments; then, breaking off suddenly, they played a hushed, soft, caressing measure; and again, almost breaking the trembling cords of their bows, they produced such an intensity of effect that the listener was almost beside himself with delight and astonishment. He sat as if bewitched; he shut his eyes, hung his head in melancholy, or raised it with a start, as the music varied; then jumped up and struck the back of his head with his hands. He positively laughed and cried at once; then, drawing a roll of bank-notes from his pocket-book, he threw it to the gypsies, and fell back in his chair, as if exhausted with so much enjoyment. And in this lies the triumph of the gypsy music; it is like that of Orpheus, which moved the rocks and trees. The soul of the Hungarian plunges, with a refinement of sensation that we can understand, but cannot follow, into this music, which, like the unrestrained indulgence of the imagination in fantasy and caprice, gives to the initiated all the intoxicating sensations experienced by opium smokers.”
The Austrian gypsies have many songs which perfectly reflect their character. Most of them are only single verses of a few lines, such as are sung everywhere in Spain; others, which are longer, seem to have grown from the connection of these verses. The following translation from the Roumanian Romany (Vassile Alexandri) gives an idea of their style and spirit:—
GYPSY SONG.
The wind whistles over the heath,
The moonlight flits over the flood;
And the gypsy lights up his fire,
In the darkness of the wood.
Hurrah!
In the darkness of the wood.Free is the bird in the air,
And the fish where the river flows;
Free is the deer in the forest,
And the gypsy wherever he goes.
Hurrah!
And the gypsy wherever he goes.a gorgio gentleman speaks.
Girl, wilt thou live in my home?
I will give thee a sable gown,
And golden coins for a necklace,
If thou wilt be my own.gypsy girl.
No wild horse will leave the prairie
For a harness with silver stars;
Nor an eagle the crags of the mountain,
For a cage with golden bars;Nor the gypsy girl the forest,
Or the meadow, though gray and cold,
For garments made of sable,
Or necklaces of gold.the gorgio.
Girl, wilt thou live in my dwelling,
For pearls and diamonds true? [82]
I will give thee a bed of scarlet,
And a royal palace, too.gypsy girl.
My white teeth are my pearlins,
My diamonds my own black eyes;
My bed is the soft green meadow,
My palace the world as it lies.Free is the bird in the air,
And the fish where the river flows;
Free is the deer in the forest,
And the gypsy wherever he goes.
Hurrah!
And the gypsy wherever he goes.
There is a deep, strange element in the gypsy character, which finds no sympathy or knowledge in the German, and very little in other Europeans, but which is so much in accord with the Slavonian and Hungarian that he who truly feels it with love is often disposed to mingle them together. It is a dreamy mysticism; an indefinite semi-supernaturalism, often passing into gloom; a feeling as of Buddhism which has glided into Northern snows, and taken a new and darker life in winter-lands. It is strong in the Czech or Bohemian, whose nature is the worst understood in the civilized world. That he should hate the German
with all his heart and soul is in the order of things. We talk about the mystical Germans, but German self-conscious mysticism is like a problem of Euclid beside the natural, unexpressed dreaminess of the Czech. The German mystic goes to work at once to expound his “system” in categories, dressing it up in a technology which in the end proves to be the only mystery in it. The Bohemian and gypsy, each in their degrees of culture, form no system and make no technology, but they feel all the more. Now the difference between true and imitative mysticism is that the former takes no form; it is even narrowed by religious creeds, and wing-clipt by pious “illumination.” Nature, and nature alone, is its real life. It was from the Southern Slavonian lands that all real mysticism, and all that higher illumination which means freedom, came into Germany and Europe; and after all, Germany’s first and best mystic, Jacob Böhme, was Bohemian by name, as he was by nature. When the world shall have discovered who the as yet unknown Slavonian German was who wrote all the best part of “Consuelo,” and who helped himself in so doing from “Der letzte Taborit,” by Herlossohn, we shall find one of the few men who understood the Bohemian.
Once in a while, as in Fanny Janauschek, the Czech bursts out into art, and achieves a great triumph. I have seen Rachel and Ristori many a time, but their best acting was shallow compared to Janauschek’s, as I have seen it in by-gone years, when she played Iphigenia and Medea in German. No one save a Bohemian could ever so intuit the gloomy profundity and unearthly fire of the Colchian sorceress. These are the things required to perfect every
artist,—above all, the tragic artist,—that the tree of his or her genius shall not only soar to heaven among the angels, but also have roots in the depths of darkness and fire; and that he or she shall play not only to the audience, and in sympathy with them, but also unto one’s self and down to one’s deepest dreams.