Csermák, Antal György

(b c1774; d Veszprém, 25 Oct 1822). Hungarian composer and violinist. According to his first biographer Count István Fáy, Csermák went to Hungary from Bohemia (by way of Vienna) in the 1790s. In 1795–6 he was leader of the first Hungarian national theatre company orchestra in Pest and Buda, and in 1795 he set up a ‘musical academy’ in the theatre. At this point he was not yet involved with Hungarian music, but gave much admired virtuoso performances of the violin music of Haydn, Mozart and Viotti. In 1802 or 1803, when Csermák was playing chamber music at Gödöllő, the home of Prince Antal Grassalkovich, he met the gypsy violinist and composer Bihari. Influenced by Bihari’s playing, and by his and János Lavotta’s verbunkos compositions, Csermák was drawn to the new Hungarian national music. In 1804 he published his first compositions in the Hungarian style, the Romances hongraises and the string trio Magyar nemzeti tánczok. From then he was a famous composer and interpreter of verbunkos music; but since he held no permanent post he led a nomadic life, moving from one country estate to another. Fáy and Liszt both recorded that he appeared at the imperial court in Vienna, and that he also visited Russia. In 1809, inspired by the final revolt of the Hungarian nobility against Napoleon, he composed his first string quartet, a programmatic suite in the national style but also greatly influenced by Mozart. The last years of Csermák’s life were filled with restless wanderings. The recollections of his contemporaries, as well as his own manuscripts dating from this period, testify to his increasing mental illness. In 1822 he was living in Veszprém, where he handed over the manuscripts of his many dance compositions to the cathedral Kapellmeister József Ruzitska, who was later to edit the great edition of verbunkos music Magyar nóták Veszprém vármegyéből (‘Hungarian tunes from County Veszprém’). He died in poverty and isolation.

Of the virtuoso violinist-composers who epitomize the golden age of verbunkos music, Csermák was intellectually the most sophisticated. His chamber music shows a high degree of theoretical understanding, combined with a thorough knowledge of the Viennese Classical style and an imaginative approach to harmony. In his chamber works he was a pioneer of a specifically Hungarian tradition in art music, which would combine certain aspects of the Viennese Classics with those of the verbunkos. He was also strongly influenced by Hungarian, Slovak and Romanian folk music, and revealed in Hungarian music a potential which was fully realized only in the 20th century. Some of Csermák’s musical ideas were exploited by Liszt (Hungarian Rhapsody no.4) and Erkel (Duo brillant). His contemporaries, with typical Romantic overstatement, dubbed him ‘the Hungarian Beethoven’, praising him as a skilled composer and instrumentalist who expressed a certain patriotic spirit, and thereby contributed to the awakening of a national consciousness among his fellow countrymen.

WORKS

MSS of unpublished works in H-Ba, Bn

chamber music

verbunkos dances

BIBLIOGRAPHY

WurzbachL

G. Mátray: ‘A magyar muzsika története’ [History of Hungarian music], Tudományos gyűjtemény, xii–xvi (Pest, 1828–32)

I. Fáy: ‘Csermák Antal’, A nagy világ képekben (Pest, 1855)

F. Liszt: Des bohémiens et de leur musique en Hongrie (Paris, 1859, 2/1881/R; Eng. trans., 1926/R, as The Gypsy in Music)

E. Major: ‘Adatok a verbunkos történetéhez’ [Contributions to the history of verbunkos], Muzsika, i (1929)

F. Brodszky: A Veszprémvármegyei Zenetársaság 1823–1832 [The music society of County Veszprém 1823–1832] (Veszprém, 1941)

F. Bónis: ‘A keszthelyi Helikon könyvtár magyar vonatkozású zenei anyagáról’ [On the material related to Hungarian music in the Helikon Library, Keszthely], Új zenei szemle, ii/2 (1951), 22–28

B. Szabolcsi: A XIX. század magyar romantikus zenéje [Hungarian Romantic music of the 19th century] (Budapest, 1951)

F. Bónis: ‘Csermák Antal kamarazenéje’ [A. Csermák’s chamber music], Új zenei szemle, iii/5 (1952), 10–15

E. Major and I. Szelényi: A magyar zongoramuzsika 100 éve [100 years of Hungarian piano music] (Budapest, 1954)

B. Szabolcsi and F. Bónis: Magyar táncok Haydn korából [Hungarian dances from the time of Haydn] (Budapest, 1959)

F. Bónis, ed.: Magyar zene a bécsi zeneműpiacon 1770–1850 [Hungarian notes on the Viennese music market 1770–1850] (Budapest, 1969), 131–78

P.P. Domokos: ‘A pannonhalmi magyar táncgyűjtemény’ [The Pannonhalma Hungarian dance music collection], Magyar zenetörténeti tanulmányok, ed. F. Bónis (Budapest, 1973), 29–51

P.P. Domokos: Hangszeres magyar tánczene a XVIII. században [Hungarian instrumental dance music in the 18th century] (Budapest, 1978)

G. Papp: ‘Die Quellen der “Verbunkos-Musik”’, SM, xxi (1979), 151–217; xxiv (1982), 35–97; xxvi (1984), 59–133

M. Eckhardt: ‘Csermák-művek egy varsói kéziratban’ [Compositions by Csermák in a Warsaw MS], Zenetudományi dolgozatok, ed. M. Berlász and M. Domokos (Budapest, 1981), 77–100

G. Papp: ‘Unbekannte “Verbunkos”-Transkriptionen von Ferenc Liszt’, SM, xxix (1987), 181–218

I. Mona: Magyar zeneműkiadók és tevékenységük 1774–1867 [Hungarian music publishers and their activity 1774–1867] (Budapest, 1989)

L. Tari, ed.: Lissznyai Julianna hangszeres gyűjteménye [Julianna Lissznyai's instrumental music collection] (Budapest, 1990)

F. Bónis: ‘Mozarts geistige Anwesenheit in der ungarischen Kultur um 1800’, Wolfgang Amadeus: summa summarum, ed. P. Csobádi (Vienna, 1990), 27–35

F. Bónis: Ungarische Tänze/Hungarian dances (Vienna, 1993)

M. Rakos, ed.: Magyar nótak Veszprém vármegyéből [Hungarian tunes from County Veszprém] (Budapest, 1994)

I. Kassai: ‘Erkel Ferenc hangszeres művei’ [The instrumental works of Ferenc Erkel], Magyar zenetörténeti tanulmányok, ed. F. Bónis (Budapest, 1995)

B. Sárosi: A hangszeres magyar táncsene [Hungarian instrumental folk music] (Budapest, 1996)

FERENC BÓNIS