Guslar
A Guslar ( Albanian : Lahutar) is an epic singer from the south-eastern European mountains. The Guslar sings heroic songs and accompanies himself on his Gusla .
He is an improviser and productive artist who creates a work on a given topic, respecting traditional forms and using a singing and lecture technique. The Guslar is particularly qualified and trained for this and is therefore not a folk song singer. Essentially, it differs from this in the ability to be able to redesign over and over again. His performances can never become popular because they cannot be adopted in the form presented.
His heroic songs do not serve any entertainment purpose, such as B. love and dance songs, but they are responsible for maintaining tradition and custom. He was therefore the most important personality within his community and world, alongside the warrior and the elder of the clan.
To understand this high position, an example from the literature serves:
Do not listen to the lies in the school books, but pay attention to and heed what our Guslen tell.
I hear the nut leaves rustle. It always smells the same, forever. Can it be anything other than rustling and smelling? So are the people, forever the same!
Amen, my son, live in the peace of God, but if someone approaches you, defend yourself!
The original Guslar could often neither read nor write and often learned the heroic songs from his father and grandfather.
origin
Guslare are associated with the emergence of the current hero song, in the second half of the 14th century. Through the defeats of the Balkan peoples and the subsequent foreign rule by the Ottomans , the oppressed, simple people tried to strengthen their hope and courage with heroic songs and to keep the struggle for freedom alive. The Guslar has its parallel in the Central Asian Ozan , a pre-Islamic hero singer and shaman , who in the Ottoman Empire became the Turkish Aşık , who still accompanies himself on the long-necked saz .
The original Guslare were mountain robbers and outlaws who could not stand the yoke of the Ottomans and fled to the mountains and forests. From there they waged a constant struggle against the state order of foreign rule. The Uskoks also joined these rioters, called Hajduken in the Southeastern European languages . In addition to the weapon, the gusla was a sacred symbol of the struggle for freedom.
species
There are essentially three types:
- The artistically and nationally most important is the Guslar, who is not only important within his closer community, but also achieved political success for his entire people through his art and propaganda. So there was, for propaganda purposes , Guslare with the Serbian regiments of the First World War , who were supposed to raise their fighting spirit there.
- There is also the Guslar, who pursues his art as a trade and can be equated with the Central European minstrel of the Middle Ages. He offers his art for a fee and writes praises for it in the form of heroic songs.
- The most socially disadvantaged species is the blind and begging Guslar. In some areas it was to these last and poorest of the Guslars that they owed their knowledge of the ancient heroes' song. Today it is extinct in the Balkans.
Well-known Guslare
- Filip Višnjić (1767–1834)
- Avdo Međedović (around 1875–1953)
literature
Fiction
- Mile Budak : Grgicas Gusle . Original as: Grgićine gusle (1930). In: Novellas . Hrvatski Izdavalački Bibliografski Zavod, Zagreb 1942, p. 27-61 .
- Josef Friedrich Perkonig: The Gusla player . Reclam, Leipzig 1943.
Scientific literature
- Curt Sachs : Handbook of musical instruments . Breitkopf & Härtel, Leipzig 1920.
- Walther Wünsch: Hero singer in Southeast Europe . Ed .: Institute for Sound Research at the University of Berlin. Otto Harrassowitz, Leipzig 1937.
Individual evidence
- ↑ Walther Wünsch: Hero singers in Southeast Europe . Institute for Sound Research at the University of Berlin. Verlag Otto Harrassowitz, Leipzig 1937, p. 16.
- ^ Dinko Šimunović: The coward . In: Croatian short stories . Wiener Verlagsgesellschaft, Vienna 1942, p. 279.
- ↑ Walther Wünsch: Hero singers in Southeast Europe . Institute for Sound Research at the University of Berlin. Verlag Otto Harrassowitz, Leipzig 1937, p. 13.
- ↑ Walther Wünsch: Hero singers in Southeast Europe . Institute for Sound Research at the University of Berlin. Verlag Otto Harrassowitz, Leipzig 1937, pp. 9-10.
- ↑ Walther Wünsch: Hero singers in Southeast Europe . Institute for Sound Research at the University of Berlin. Verlag Otto Harrassowitz, Leipzig 1937, p. 16 f.