Liszt and the issue of so called Gypsy music

• Authors: Anna G. Piotrowska
• Languages of publication: PL

Abstracts

PL

The article attempts to shed light on Liszt’s connections with so called Gypsy music, with particular emphasis on the sources and manifestations of the composer’s interest in the subject. The paper also shows the effects of Liszt’s thought on his academic successors. Liszt’s fascination with Gypsy music and culture is discussed by outlining his childhood memories as well as indicating numerous personal contacts he had with renowned Gypsy musicians. The author of the paper also links Liszt’s enchantment with Gypsy culture with his readiness to identify his travelling virtuoso status with that of a Gypsy-wanderer. Special attention in the article is put on Liszt’s book Des Bohemiens et de leur musique en Hongrie (1859). The author of the article claims that Liszt’s cosmopolitanism may be a key factor while explaining the composer’s predilection to Gypsy culture and music. While focusing on the reception of Liszt’s views on so called Gypsy music by the posterity Bartok’s interpretation of Liszt’s ideas is reminded. Discussed are also their repercussions in the second half of the twentieth century and early twenty first century.

Keywords

PL

Franz Liszt; Gypsy music; Hungary; Hungarian music; national music; Bela Bartok

• Publisher: Uniwersytet im. Adama Mickiewicza w Poznaniu
• Journal: Interdisciplinary Studies in Musicology
• Year: 2014
• Issue: 13
• Pages: 127-140

Dates

published

2018-10-17

Contributors

author

Anna G. Piotrowska

• She is mainly interested in sociological and cultural aspects of musical life. So far she has authored three books in Polish: The Romantic Vision of the Gypsy in the Music o f the 19th and the First Half o f the 20th century (2012), Topos o f Gypsy Music in European Culture (2011) and The Idea o f National Music in the Works o f American Composers o f the Early 20th - century (2003) as well as published numerous articles (in Polish, English, German, Slovak and Georgian). Her book Topos o f Gypsy Music in European Culture won in 2011 the prestigious honorary W. Felczak and H. Wereszycki Award by Polish Historical Association. In 2010 Anna G. Piotrowska was a Fulbright Fellow in Boston University, USA and in 2009 she was awarded the Moritz Csaky Preis at Austrian Academy of Sciences. She was also the recipient of the Mellon Fellowship in Edinburgh University, UK in 2005. Anna G. Piotrowska actively participates in many international conferences. Currently she is associated with the Department of Theory and Anthropology of Music at the Institute of Musicology, Jagiellonian University in Kraków, Poland.