BAND OF GYPSIES

Giero, just off Liszt Ferenc Ter, is one of Budapest’s many cellar bars. It’s cramped and with a constant pall of smoke and you can’t hear anything except the music. On Friday, just as on every night, its barrel-shaped structure reverberated with the soaring and frenzied sound of the Roma (gypsy) house band, and we were seeing them for the first time.

There were five or six musicians of varying ages and we were told that they play in shifting combinations; it seems as if anyone from their number can just turn up and join in. So in this way it’s like a traditional Irish session, but the similarity ends there. For in this band were not one but three players of such virtuosity that it set them apart from any run of the mill folkies, and they might easily have been performing in far less humble surroundings.

Leading the band tonight was a guest fiddler, a stocky bespectacled gent in his fifties. He was a consummate showman and reminded me of a figure from Death in Venice (or Mario’s magician?) in the way that he peered over his glasses at each guest, cajoling them, drawing them out of themselves, and not letting go until he got complete involvement: smiles, nods, or raucous singing along. He strutted up and down between the tables, exuding a simmering sensuality, completely at odds with his age, but which he was obviously unwilling to contain. His scratchy notes sprang out, endlessly playful and unpredictable, teasing the main melody, keeping you hooked.

No doubt slightly annoyed to be under this man’s shadow was the usual lead fiddler, a wiry Casanova with sculpted cheekbones like someone from a 1940’s film. This man intently serenaded the women with poignant and lyrical phrases, all the time fixing them with a gaze that could have scorched their skins, as their men shifted uneasily in their chairs. With his instrument thrust under his chin, he adopted a variety of theatrical poses as part of his game. Every now and then he would stop and give a little bow.

Presiding over all this was the Buddha-like cimbalom player enthroned behind his instrument. (This looks something like a small wooden grand piano, and has several different sets of strings, which are hit with beaters.) His presence conferred an air of benevolence to the whole ensemble. He threw a series of amiable glances around the room, quite clearly delighted with his apparently haphazard genius. Moving his arms back and forwards piston-like, he beat out rhythmic patterns with superhuman speed and precision. The slightly out-of-tune cimbalom responded with streams of soft, slightly muffled notes like a silent movie score, or an old music box.

The searingly intense melodies themselves, built from exotic scales, rebounded from the walls and enveloped everyone. They spoke eloquently of another century and a different way of life which these people still live.