The young violinist recognised the last scratchy notes of the minuet, the closer minuet was well known and perfectly executed… Executed, indeed !
It was a regular, intricate music known for its difficulty and its undeniable harmony; but it had no soul. No, no music on this planet had any attraction to Artzel… except he could hear already the first notes of his Hymn. It called him, begged him to climb onto the stage. In no time, he was in the centre of the stage. His white violin was set on a tiny cushion on his left shoulder. The side of his jaw caressed firmly the wooden body of his instrument; it was a carnal, solft, comforting contact : the last four fingers of his left hand were already positioned on the strings which his thumb moved the handle into an easy, firm position.
The horse-hair brushed the strings of the white violin but the bow only needed the slightest movement of the right wrist, to play the first note… Artzel was no longer there, not any longer in the word of mortals. Not any longer in this royal banqueting hall. No longer facing the most honourable people of the Kingdom… He was… in the middle of his languid note summoning him of play. In a powerful heart-rending vibration.
Eventually, the tedious minuet without any soul died in a final cord, pompous and ridiculous. Then the air was clear, no more pestilence musicale sullied the power of the first note from the White Violin, that very note only waiting for a silent breath to explode in Artzel’s ear drums. The bow glided on the dark scarlet strings. A heart-rending cry spurted from the violin. In the banqueting hall, voices stopped. The next note bore into the audience’s thoughts. Powerful, indeed, piercing, incredible. The bow continued with a set of three long stirring cries.
All the looks were targeted on the stage and the young musician, playing with closed eyes and holding this hypnotic White Violin. Its laments sounded in all hear, in all minds, in all souls. In the banqueting hall where a notable, princely birthday was being celebrated, a music instrument was weeping.
When the vaults, came the funeral chant of a White Violin. A vibrating solo full of despair, weariness of life and its ephemeral illusions. A hymen to a life disappearing and to a death eagerly desired. A laceration for the body and the mind.
In the banqueting hall, nobody was able to move or to conceive a coherent thought. Everything… All emotions, all words, all reasonings were snatched by the undivided attention, demanded by the scarlet strings bleeding under the blond horsehair of the rough bow. A suicidal hymn.
Heartrending, stifling, oppressing…
(Translated by Prof. ABM Arrouas (France) & Erina George, M.A, (Belfast)
Photo de Baohm