The Concept of Race in Musicological Thought: From General Remarks to a Case Study of So-called Gypsy Music in European Culture

Abstract

The chapter is divided into two parts: the first presents the general outline of the concept of race in musicological thought; the second is dedicated to the case study of so-called “Gypsy music.” Having roots in the Enlightenment association of music, race and nature (J. J. Rousseau, J. G. Herder and others), the concept of race was elaborated heavily in German musicological writings, not only due to political and social reasons, but also because musicology was established in German-speaking circles as a Eurocentric discipline called Musikwissenschaft. Studying all other musical cultures, on the other hand, fell into the orbit of either racial or exotic discourse. I show that in reference to “Gypsy music,” the concept of race was exploited in two opposite dimensions. On the one hand, the nineteenth- and early twentieth-century writings on Gypsy music reveal a tendency to accuse Gypsy musicians of a lack of authenticity, pinpointing the common Gypsy practice of performing the repertoire of the host country in a “contaminated” way. On the other hand, however, Gypsy music served in nineteenth-century Hungary and early twentieth-century Spain as a resource in the creation of a national music. The balance between these two representations of Gypsy music—negating and absorbing at the same time—both reveals and represents the broader European phenomenon of combining fear and fascination with Gypsy culture, symbolically manifested in the coverage of so-called Gypsy music.