The broad equipment of the new Russian group is seen at the outset in
the works of its founder, Balakirew. And thus the difference between
them and Tschaikowsky lay mainly in the formulated aim.[A]
[Footnote A: In the choice of subjects there was a like breadth.
Balakirew was inspired by "King Lear," as was Tschaikowsky. And amid a
wealth of Slavic legend and of kindred Oriental lore, he would turn to
the rhythms of distant Spain for a poetic theme.]
The national idea, so eminent in modern music, is not everywhere equally
justified. And here, as in an object-lesson, we see the true merits of
the problem. While one nation spontaneously utters its cry, another,
like a cock on the barnyard, starts a movement in mere idle vanity, in
sheer self-glorification.
In itself there is nothing divine in a national idea that needs to be
enshrined in art. Deliberate segregation is equally vain, whether it be
national or social. A true racial celebration must above all be
spontaneous. Even then it can have no sanction in art, unless it utter a
primal motive of resistance to suppression, the elemental pulse of life
itself. There is somehow a divine dignity about the lowest in human
rank, whether racial or individual. The oppressed of a nation stands a
universal type, his wrongs are the wrongs of all, and so his lament has
a world-wide appeal. And in truth from the lowest class rises ever the
rich spring of folk-song of which all the art is reared, whence comes
the paradox that the peasant furnishes the song for the delight of his
oppressors, while they boast of it as their own.
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